Category: Reviews

Review – Beauvallet

Posted September 19, 2014 by in Reviews / 0 Comments

Cover of Beauvallet by Georgette HeyerBeauvallet, Georgette Heyer

This certainly wasn’t my favourite Heyer novel so far, given the hero’s grabby hands and ego, but at least the heroine was a match for him in many ways, and it is a fun set up. It’s not a Regency novel like most of Heyer’s others, but one of the more historical ones, and honestly I could’ve dispensed with the romance for more of Nick swashbuckling his way around Spain as a spy. That plot, I liked: I wonder what Heyer would have done if that was her focus.

While this isn’t as amusing as most of her work, and the romance wasn’t exactly to die for, I did enjoy it well enough. It’s only the fact that I know Heyer also wrote The Talisman Ring and The Grand Sophy, both of which I love, that means this rather pales in comparison.

Rating: 2/5

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Review – Peas & Queues

Posted September 18, 2014 by in Reviews / 0 Comments

Cover of Peas & Queues, by Sandi ToksvigPeas & Queues, Sandi Toksvig

I’m not sure what other people were expecting with this: luckily, I approached it for exactly what it is, a book which offers advice on all sorts of situations and how to navigate them with dignity and politeness. Sort of like Captain Awkward, but more formal, and less tailored to a specific individual or situation. It contains all sorts of advice from dealing with family life to what to do at weddings and funerals.

It even touches on some etiquette that seems obvious when you hear it, but which people genuinely do miss. Like asking a lesbian couple about their sex life and which of them is the man — just don’t. If you wouldn’t ask the question of a straight couple, don’t ask it of a gay couple. A lot of Toksvig’s advice boils down to not putting other people in awkward situations (e.g. like public proposals where there’s an obligation to say yes or look ridiculous) and respecting other people’s privacy.

Pretty solid. And it’s sometimes interesting, sometimes funny, sometimes useful — and sometimes, as all generalisations are, not useful. At least Toksvig acknowledges — repeatedly — the importance of context rather than a rigid set of rules.

Rating: 3/5

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Review – On My Way to Jorvik

Posted September 17, 2014 by in Reviews / 0 Comments

Cover of On My Way to Jorvik by John SunderlandOn My Way to Jorvik, John Sunderland

The most interesting part of this book, for me, is obviously the Jorvik part. It’s fascinating to see how someone with no experience managed to get into a big project like the one at Jorvik, and then create something pretty much universally acclaimed for the way it changed people’s relationship to the history there.

The problem is, the book is about the way to Jorvik as much as Jorvik itself, so there’s all sorts of distractions along the way, and details about Sunderland I wasn’t that interested in. Not just the formative incidents of skipping school to browse in museums, but also his relationships, his pre-Jorvik projects no matter how irrelevant, and weird incidents of the type that happen to nearly everyone at least once: a lady in a cinema with a “suspiciously deep voice” offering him sweeties. Some of the incidents are interesting, and Sunderland has a vivid imagination, but mostly I was just waiting for the parts about Jorvik, and wondering why the hell I’d be interested in that anecdote from the cinema, or what exactly Sunderland did on his days skiving from school.

There was some interest in it on another level, because Sunderland’s a Yorkshire lad, and while I wouldn’t say I’m a Yorkshire lass, I did grow up there, and I could put the things he said into that context and see how utterly Yorkshire he was being — things he said, his attitudes, etc. I doubt that’s going to be a big draw for many people, but it was part of the enjoyment for me: wry smiles and snorts of recognition.

The part about the actual Jorvik project is interesting. He doesn’t talk much about the dig or the actual findings there: he talks about how they set up the space, preservation methods, how they got those ‘piped smells’ sorted out, the commissioning of the figures… I’ve been to Jorvik, though not recently; possibly even long enough ago that I saw something like the exhibition Sunderland created, even though he says it’s been revamped and changed now. So it was interesting to get a behind the scenes view of how a very unique museum was put together, by someone outside the museum business, and how it upped the ante for other projects and museums. It is ultimately an autobiography, though, not a book about Jorvik.

Rating: 3/5

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Top Ten Tuesday

Posted September 16, 2014 by in Reviews / 3 Comments

This week’s theme for Top Ten Tuesday is “Top Ten Authors I’ve Only Read One Book From But NEED to Read More”, which… I’m not quite sure if I can do, since I tend to go on sprees. Let’s see what I can manage.

  1. Steven Brust. I’ve only so far read Jhereg, though I know I’m gonna read the rest of the series.
  2. Laura Lam. I’ve read one of the short Vestigial Tales, but not the main series.
  3. Phyllis Ann Karr. I loved Idylls of the Queen (and wrote part of my dissertation on it). Lucky for me, I have a few more of her books waiting in my queue.
  4. Steven Erikson. I’ve got almost the whole Malazan series to go. I might have to reread Gardens of the Moon by the time I get round to that, though.
  5. Philip Reeve. I’ve read Here Lies Arthur, and have a bunch of others on my list.
  6. Jorge Luis Borges. This is more because, much as I wanted it to, The Book of Imaginary Beings didn’t wow me.
  7. Italo Calvino. Same goes, with Invisible Cities. There’s a lot I wanted to love.
  8. James Morrow. I haven’t actually quite finished This is the Way the World Ends yet, but it fascinated me the way he managed to draw me in, despite my usual aversion to comic novels of any kind.
  9. Kameron Hurley. I’ve actually only finished reading her book of essays. I really need to read God’s War and Mirror Empire.
  10. Lucius Shepard. I’ve only read The Dragon Griaule, and that was just fascinating, the weirdness of the world and the way he built it up.

Oh, I could manage after all. What about everyone else?

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Review – The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

Posted September 15, 2014 by in Reviews / 0 Comments

Posting this old review since the book is a Kindle Daily Deal today!

Cover of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca SklootThe Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Rebecca Skloot

I’ve wanted to read this book for a long time. Cancer scares me silly, so it’s not something I was able to do for a while, but I finally got round to it today. And in perfect time, because today I was an event marshal at a charity event raising money for cancer research, and tomorrow I’m running in that same charity event to raise money myself. (This seems an opportune moment to point at my fundraising page. Here.) I’m wearing a t-shirt tomorrow on which I’ve written the names of people who’ve died of cancer — my grandparents among them, but including people I’ve never known, people I’ve never even heard of. In fact, you can contribute names yourself in the comments to this review, if you like. Anyway, HeLa/Henrietta Lacks is the only one given special treatment, written larger than the others. Without ever knowing, she has contributed the most to cancer research and indeed to medical research of anyone living or dead. Rebecca Skloot’s book is important because it seeks to unearth what little information remains about the real Henrietta — a young black woman with cervical cancer — and how her legacy has affected the world, including her children.

Reading the one-star reviews, there’s a lot of concern about Skloot’s choice to document her personal activities in the search for HeLa, and the fact that she’s profiting from this story while pointing out the injustice of the fact that Henrietta Lacks’ children do not even have medical insurance. I’m not sure myself why she couldn’t outright give money from the profits on this book to the family, but she has set up a foundation. Most important is the fact that in writing this book she had the permission and cooperation of the family, who read the book in draft form and approved it. Deborah Lacks, Henrietta’s daughter, repeatedly asks for this book to be written just as it is, telling the full truth about the family.

Skloot documents first the process of discovering the HeLa cell line’s potential, and moves on to the contributions made to scientific knowledge because of it. Slowly, her focus expands to examine the legacy of HeLa for the family, and the effect upon them. It’s pretty shocking reading, because this family was completely taken advantage of. Laying aside any ethical debate about whether the cells belonged to them and whether they could or should profit from them, they didn’t even understand what was happening. Nobody bothered to explain to them, even while taking samples from them to compare to the HeLa cells.

I don’t think this book is perfect, but it certainly succeeded in opening a dialogue. Maybe we should never have known who HeLa was — her genetic code has been published, arguably violating the privacy of her descendants too — but now we do know, questions about the race and class issues surrounding the family need to be asked. And judging from what the Lacks family are now doing in terms of talking about Henrietta, giving talks and so on, I think Skloot did a great thing.

There is a lot about the author herself in this book, because it was a personal journey; whether that’s to some degree appropriative is a good question to ask, and one I don’t feel I can answer.

Rating: 5/5

 

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Review – Book of Skulls

Posted September 14, 2014 by in Reviews / 2 Comments

Cover of Book of Skulls by Robert SilverbergBook of Skulls, Robert Silverberg

I liked the idea behind this, and I even liked the way Silverberg set up the four characters, stereotypes that over the course of the novel are pried open and exposed for the often hypocritical things they are. The writing, too, is pretty good, lyrical and intense. The psychological building up and tearing down of the characters works really well, and it’s not easy to predict who will commit the murder, who will be the sacrifice, etc. The only real problem for me was that I kept having to check the chapter headings to see who exactly was talking: despite the four very different character backgrounds, they didn’t sound different at all.

But. The stereotypes manage to be so offensive — like, the portrayal of the gay male character/s is kind of horrifying, the whole portrayal of what gay people are like as a community. I know this isn’t exactly a new book, and doubtless Silverberg knew he was using stereotypes and that real gay people come from all over the spectrum, but it’s still pretty ghastly to read.

I can see why people enjoy it, I think, but euch, not for me.

Rating: 2/5

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Review – Radio Free Albemuth

Posted September 10, 2014 by in Reviews / 2 Comments

Cover of Radio Free Albemuth by Philip K DickRadio Free Albemuth, Philip K. Dick

I think I’ve only read one Philip K. Dick book before, and that was Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, and I didn’t really get on with that. I wonder now if that was due to different interests at the time, not settling down with it enough… because I did enjoy Radio Free Albemuth, and it’s making me want to try going back to Do Androids Dream and to some of Dick’s other work, and have another try.

It’s a smooth read, confidently written, and easy to follow — which as I recall, was my problem with Do Androids Dream; I just couldn’t keep a handle on what was happening and why, for whatever reason. I was braced for that with this book, but actually, it unfolded reasonably easily. The sci-fi aspects are well done, and the dystopian setting is sketched in so that you can imagine the whole world from the little bits you do see. There’s something very 1984 about it, obviously, but with — well, I won’t spoiler it.

The discomforting thing is really the fact that this is semi-autobiographical, and Dick really believed this, or some of this anyway, was happening to him. When I didn’t know that — I didn’t know much about Dick, other than something about Harlan Ellison saying he used drugs? — it was fine, but once I did, I found myself looking for what he was trying to say with it, trying to find his line between fact and fiction.

The bad news is, I’m pretty sure he was bonkers. The good news is, I don’t think it was a harmful kind of bonkers, and he could tell me about Valis all day if he wanted. I’d probably just feel a little cringy at the total disconnect from reality, outside of a science fiction novel. In a way, if Dick really did believe all that… well, he lived in a universe that was full of different possibilities. You’ve got to envy him that a little.

Rating: 4/5

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Review – Magic Burns

Posted September 9, 2014 by in Reviews / 4 Comments

Cover of Magic Burns by Ilona AndrewsMagic Burns, Ilona Andrews

I continue to really like this series. Sure, the writing isn’t sparkling deathless prose, but it’s functional and brings across the voice of the narrator — very no-nonsense, down to earth, tough-talking woman. What continues to intrigue and please me is the characterisation of Kate: stubborn, pig-headed, yes, but also willing to admit when she’s wrong, picking her battles, not afraid to admit when she needs help… Not afraid, even, to admit that she’s vulnerable, alone, that she’s not entirely happy to be without a partner. At the same time, she isn’t overly sentimental about it — though nor is she rushing into the bed of every guy who smiles at her.

Overall, it’s a good balance, to my mind. There’s also interesting world building — the circumstances of the magic waves in Atlanta, the history behind Kate that we don’t really get to know yet, the words of power, the different groups of supernaturals… And it’s pretty well paced: there were a couple of points where it seemed to stick a bit, but I pretty much read it in one go.

I keep coming to this expecting total bubblegum, but I come away happier than I expected because they dodge so many of my pet peeves and annoyances.

Rating: 4/5; review of the first book

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Review – Eating the Sun

Posted September 8, 2014 by in Reviews / 0 Comments

Cover of Eating the Sun, by Oliver MortonEating the Sun, Oliver Morton

I really wanted to like this and get on with the science in it. It is, after all, supposed to be popular science, and the biology of plants is something I’m really not well versed in at all. I did manage to understand some of the concepts — the flow of electrons and how that drives energy production — but overall, I found that it was a bit too high level for me. Although, it’s odd, because parts of it were very pop-sciency in the way they focused on the careers of scientists and how they untangled the mysteries of plant respiration. The first few were fascinating, but then it got bogged down in the detail.

Overall, I think someone with more of the basics than me might get on with this a lot better, but I didn’t have the focus for it — and Oliver Morton’s writing wasn’t as strong for me as, say, Richard Fortey’s. I’d read Fortey writing about paint drying and still be interested, while Morton’s writing was about on the level of watching paint dry.

Rating: 2/5

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Review – Black Unicorn

Posted September 7, 2014 by in Reviews / 2 Comments

Cover of Black Unicorn by Tanith LeeBlack Unicorn, Tanith Lee

This is my first book by Tanith Lee, I’m pretty sure, which surprised me. I’ve always known the name, always known that people thought I’d be interested, and I’m sure I have actually bought some Tanith Lee books before, but I’m pretty sure that this is the first I’ve read. I was interested, but not really absorbed — Tanaquil is okay, but the relationship with her mother, even the stranding in the desert, felt fairly average. There’s not much explanation of the world — which in some ways, I prefer: at least Tanith Lee didn’t give me a massive spiel about the world, cramming it too full with information. It’s a slim book, reads fast, but it wasn’t tipping above ‘okay’ for me.

What changed my mind and earned it four stars was the ending — not so much anything Tanaquil did, or the major events of the plot, but the fact that in the perfect world, Tanaquil and the peeve corrupt everything. And not just that on its own, but the way that Tanaquil reacts: the betrayed feeling, the anger. Some writers might have made her grateful just to have witnessed it or whatever, but Lee imagines what it would be like to be denied that, and I like the way Tanaquil deals with it.

Plot-wise, it wasn’t that special, and I’m not sure I want to read the other books in the series. But those scenes, those moments, did speak to me.

Rating: 4/5

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