Tag: book reviews

Review – A Magical Girl Retires

Posted October 19, 2025 by Nicky in Reviews / 2 Comments

Review – A Magical Girl Retires

A Magical Girl Retires

by Park Seolyeon

Genres: Fantasy
Pages: 176
Rating: two-stars
Synopsis:

A millennial turned magical girl must combat climate change and credit card debt in this delightful, witty, and wildly imaginative ode to magical girl manga.

Twenty-nine, depressed, and drowning in credit card debt after losing her job during the pandemic, a millennial woman decides to end her troubles by jumping off Seoul’s Mapo Bridge.

But her suicide attempt is interrupted by a girl dressed all in white—her guardian angel. Ah Roa is a clairvoyant magical girl on a mission to find the greatest magical girl of all time. And our protagonist just may be that special someone.

But the young woman’s initial excitement turns to frustration when she learns being a magical girl in real life is much different than how it’s portrayed in stories. It isn’t just destiny—it’s work. Magical girls go to job fairs, join trade unions, attend classes. And for this magical girl there are no special powers and no great perks, and despite being magical, she still battles with low self-esteem. Her magic wand . . . is a credit card—which she must use to defeat a terrifying threat that isn’t a monster or an intergalactic war. It’s global climate change. Because magical girls need to think about sustainability, too.

Park Seolyeon reimagines classic fantasy tropes in a novel that explores real-world challenges that are both deeply personal and universal: the search for meaning and the desire to do good in a world that feels like it’s ending. A fun, fast-paced, and enchanting narrative that sparkles thanks to award-nominated translator Anton Hur, A Magical Girl Retires reminds us that we are all magical girls—that fighting evil by moonlight and winning love by daylight can be anyone's game.

I’d been curious about Park Seolyeon’s A Magical Girl Retires for a while, since magical girl stories are fun and the cover art very much calls up that aesthetic and genre. It was available on Kobo Plus, and looked like a quick read, so I snagged it and tore through it: it really is a quick read, very breezily written (despite some dark themes, e.g. the whole first chapter involves the main character considering suicide, and her depression is clear throughout) and with fun art that livens things up.

Unfortunately it felt like it was too much of a quick read — everything happened so fast, each chapter was so short, and I could’ve done with more build-up of the relationship between the main character and Ah Roa (which could’ve been really cute). There’s a lot of fun stuff in the detail of how being a magical girl works, the fact that there’s a magical girl union, etc etc, it just… skips by so fast that it’s difficult to get invested.

Someone else mentioned this was a case where a short story should be expanded into a novel rather than vice versa, and yeah, that’s the feeling I had. The main character is well-drawn as far as it goes (though it’s mostly the depression!) but everything else feels sketched in, and the stakes are so high that that doesn’t seem right. There are definitely neat ideas here, just. Hmmm. It didn’t quite work.

Rating: 2/5 (“it was okay”)

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Review – Solo Leveling, vol 6

Posted October 19, 2025 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Review – Solo Leveling, vol 6

Solo Leveling

by Dubu, Chugong

Genres: Fantasy, Manga
Pages: 304
Series: Solo Leveling #6
Rating: four-stars
Synopsis:

Jinwoo continues to progress rapidly through the Demon's 6 Castle, climbing toward the top floor with the help of a demon noble who has agreed to escort the intruder if it means not having to fight him herself! Preoccupied with his personal quest, Jinwoo is unaware of the escalating threat outside the dungeon. The ant magic beasts that laid waste to Jeju Island are looking to relocate, and if they reach the mainland, all of Korea could fall. Will the combined S-ranks of Japan and Korea be enough to quell the swarm—and will Jinwoo be joining them?!

Volume 6 of the Solo Leveling manhua is a lot of fun, though it feels a bit weirdly paced, or like the volumes are weirdly split up. The first half is basically all about Jinwoo’s ascent of the Demon’s Castle, with lots of action and fighting that involves Jinwoo being… still clever, but mostly also way overpowered.

The second half is largely about the Jeju Island plot, with Japanese and Korean high-ranked hunters joining up, testing each other, and then starting the raid… and Jinwoo isn’t a super important part of that plot, since he chooses not to get involved due to his mother’s recovery. It feels really weird that he’s not involved, narratively, but I’m guessing he’ll be getting stuck in soon enough. I can’t imagine the system’s super interested in him no longer hunting…

The art and colours continue to be lovely, and while I don’t follow the action scenes well, eh, I never do — just not a visual person. I’m very curious where it’s all going, and also probably curious enough to start reading the light novel.

Rating: 4/5 (“really liked it”)

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Review – Between Two Rivers

Posted October 17, 2025 by Nicky in Reviews / 2 Comments

Review – Between Two Rivers

Between Two Rivers

by Moudhy Al-Rashid

Genres: History, Non-fiction
Pages: 336
Rating: four-stars
Synopsis:

In ancient times, the vast area that stretches across what is now modern-day Iraq and Syria saw the rise and fall of epic civilizations who built the foundations of our world today. It was in this region, which we call Mesopotamia, that history was written down for the very first time.

With startling modernity, the people of Mesopotamia left behind hundreds of thousands of fragments of their everyday lives. Immortalised in clay and stone are intimate details from 4000 years ago. We find accounts of an enslaved person negotiating their freedom, a dog's paw prints as it accidentally stepped into fresh clay, a parent desperately trying to soothe a baby with a lullaby, the imprint of a child's teeth as it sank them into their clay homework, and countless receipts for beer.

In Between Two Rivers, historian Dr Moudhy Al-Rashid examines what these people chose to preserve in their own words about their lives, creating the first historical records and allowing us to brush hands with them thousands of years later.

Bringing us closer than ever before to the lives of ancient people, Between Two Rivers tells not just the history of Mesopotamia, but the story of how history was made.

Moudhy Al-Rashid’s Between Two Rivers is a conversational, fairly personal introduction to some Mesopotamian history through things that she is interested in herself, which made it a nice companion for a quiet evening, while leaving a bit of an itch for more info in some cases. The chapters lead on nicely from each other, building up a picture of ancient life based on the finds in the palace of Ennigaldi-Nanna, a priestess and daughter of a Babylonian king.

In the process, while introducing the finds and contextualising them as best as possible, Al-Rashid digs into some of the assumptions that archaeologists make (does a label for an item make a museum? does the presence of learning materials make a school, or are there other explanations like reuse of waste?). Perhaps the thing that startled me the most was realising that we can actually follow some specific ancient people through scribal records by name, getting a fair outline of their lives.

What’s most obviously lacking, though, is any kind of photography or even sketches to show us what she’s describing. She does write pretty good descriptions that give me a fairly reasonable idea of what she’s discussing, though I have no “mind’s eye” and thus I’m not really able to “picture” them in the way most people can.

So, yeah, pretty conversational, sometimes a little rambling/repetitive, overall: I enjoyed her style and her choices of topics, and found it an overall very pleasant read, but it did make me want to return to Selena Wisnom’s The Library of Ancient Wisdom and spend more time with that in hopes of more detail.

Rating: 4/5 (“really liked it”)

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Review – The Man Who Was Thursday

Posted October 16, 2025 by Nicky in Reviews / 4 Comments

Review – The Man Who Was Thursday

The Man Who Was Thursday

by G.K. Chesterton

Genres: Classics, Mystery
Pages: 224
Rating: two-stars
Synopsis:

In a park in London, secret policeman Gabriel Syme strikes up a conversation with an anarchist. Sworn to do his duty, Syme uses his new acquaintance to go undercover in Europe's Central Anarchist Council and infiltrate their deadly mission, even managing to have himself voted to the position of 'Thursday'. When Syme discovers another undercover policeman on the Council, however, he starts to question his role in their operations. And as a desperate chase across Europe begins, his confusion grows, as well as his confidence in his ability to outwit his enemies. But he has still to face the greatest terror that the Council has: a man named Sunday, whose true nature is worse than Syme could ever have imagined...

I don’t know quite what I expected from G.K. Chesterton’s The Man Who Was Thursday. It’s a book I’ve known about for a long time, but I had no idea about any details, other than that it was kind of a thriller and that it was pretty influential (or at least popular or talked about).

Having read it now, I wouldn’t have pegged it as being by the same guy as the Father Brown stories. I also still couldn’t tell you entirely what I think it’s about: it does have thriller elements, as Syme and later others go up against anarchists, culminating in a weird chase across the country (twice). I know it’s a spoiler, but it’s hard to explain how weird this book is without adding that of course it later turns out to have all been a dream.

It’s hard to know how to take it all in part because it all turns out to have been a dream. There are parts which are pretty funny, but then there are also moments where Syme’s repugnance really comes through and it feels almost horrifying.

Such a weird mix, and I don’t think I enjoyed it, though it’s interesting to have read it and have it logged as context somewhere in the back of my mind when people write about it or mention it in passing.

Rating: 2/5 (“it was okay”)

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Review – Deadly Earnest

Posted October 14, 2025 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Review – Deadly Earnest

Deadly Earnest

by Joan Cockin

Genres: Crime, Mystery
Pages: 288
Series: Inspector Cam #3
Rating: three-stars
Synopsis:

They were eight candidates who arrived in 'Humpstead Manor' - otherwise known as 'the Hump' - all of whom were part of an elite interview process for a major job in Africa. But even before the examinations began, one of the assembled seemed to be being singled out for something rather more a great job. Murder. Inspector Cam finds that what he thought was a relaxed trip observing how the process worked, finds he is needed to do a lot more than observe. Deadly Earnest, published in 1952 was the third and final novel that came from the Joan Cockin stable. It's a strong candidate to be her best.

Joan Cockin’s Deadly Earnest is a very classic kind of mystery, which was exactly what I wanted of it: methodical in building up a situation, letting it all fall apart like a house of cards, and then letting the detective set everything to rights and recreate order. It’s quite atmospheric at times, but in the end it delivers the expected payoff.

Most of the cast comes across as rather unpleasant, and even Inspector Cam — who I’ve liked in past books — didn’t always sit well with me. It’s partly the rather nasty atmosphere, I think, and from a modern perspective, also the smug colonialist attitudes of the characters who plan to go off and become administrators of the Empire.

Not a favourite, but overall it delivered what I was hoping for from it.

Rating: 3/5 (“liked it”)

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Review – Paladin’s Strength

Posted October 13, 2025 by Nicky in Reviews / 4 Comments

Review – Paladin’s Strength

Paladin's Strength

by T. Kingfisher

Genres: Fantasy, Mystery, Romance
Pages: 426
Series: The Saint of Steel #2
Rating: four-stars
Synopsis:

From two-time Hugo Award-winning author T. Kingfisher comes Paladin's Strength, the perfect blend of cosy fantasy romance and classic fantasy adventure featuring an order of secretive nuns, a swashbuckling paladin and a strange hive of rabbits.

He's a paladin of a dead god, tracking a supernatural killer across a continent. She's a nun from a secretive order on the trail of the raiders who burned her convent and kidnapped her sisters.

When their paths cross at the point of a sword, Istvhan and Clara will be pitched headlong into each other's quests, facing off against enemies both living and dead. But Clara has a secret that could jeopardise the growing trust between them, a secret that will lead them to the gladiatorial pits of a corrupt city, and beyond...

I really enjoyed T. Kingfisher’s Paladin’s Strength, even though at times I think it could’ve used being a bit shorter — a few pages less here and there. I think I had the same thought about The Wonder Engine, so I suspect it’s partly a matter of style, and I do enjoy T. Kingfisher’s writing quite a bit. She has a thing about paladins, and Istvhan is a fun example of the breed: a little less absolutely subsumed by being a paladin than Stephen, a bit less haunted than Galen, but still profoundly bound by requiring himself to be decent.

So decent that he can’t see that Clara’s a perfectly capable, willing women who would like to go to bed with him. The will they/won’t they is pretty frustrating given we see both sides of the potential relationship and thus know that they’re just totally failing to communicate, and I think it’s here that some pages could’ve been cut profitably. It all feels like it drags out a bit too long, though on the other hand, they’re both so stubborn that I guess it’s not super surprising that they have to be dragged slowly to a conclusion.

The discovery of the origins of the smooth men is fascinating — and definitely surprised me, since I figured it was going to be a bigger plot running through all four books, and it seems kinda… wrapped up? And it was fascinating to explore more of the world too, learning about St Ursa, the Aral, Morstone…

Looking forward to the next book, which looks quite short compared to this one!

Rating: 4/5 (“really liked it”)

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Review – The Other World’s Books Depend on the Bean Counter (manga), vol 4

Posted October 12, 2025 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Review – The Other World’s Books Depend on the Bean Counter (manga), vol 4

The Other World's Books Depend on the Bean Counter

Pages: 178
Series: The Other World's Books Depend on the Bean Counter (manga) #4
Rating: three-stars
Synopsis:

So it’s been a bit, but an accountant guy somehow went down a portalhole and into a fantasy world. Once he got there, the first thing he asked for was a job. That’s how Kondou’s career in the Romany Kingdom’s Accounting Department began and part of the reason a stunning knight captain stumbled upon a bean counter in distress. Venturing to the depths of a dangerous forest on a quest to clear the miasma is the exact opposite of what Kondou’s knight in shining armor wants him to do. However, our intrepid bean counter is a man with a plan, so venture forth he does—much to the captain’s dismay. But turnabout is fair play, which is why Captain Aresh makes his own declaration on their way back…

I’m enjoying The Other World’s Books Depend on the Bean Counter in many ways, especially as in this volume we’re getting to see more of the world (and the Holy Maiden realises her situation a bit better, and thankfully seems to be a bit less of a brat/less inclined to angle for Aresh). Seiichirou is ridiculously competent, but that’s always fun — I can’t help but compare him a bit to Lizel, of A Gentle Noble’s Vacation Recommendation.

That said… this series has some problems, and they eclipse the good stuff so much I need to talk about them at more length right now.

I am still giving it three stars, but I want to heavily caveat that: there’s a lot of dubious consent and potential coercion here. I think we’re perhaps supposed to understand that Seiichirou has powerful allies and could get out of the situation if he really wanted to, and that in a way he’s using Aresh — but this isn’t always explicit enough. It seems like Aresh is perhaps taking advantage of Seiichirou’s need for protection to be intimate with him, and that’s a bit of a red flag, even if Aresh wasn’t being so controlling “for Seiichirou’s own good”.

I’m wondering if this is better or worse in the light novel, and will be finding out since I’ve ordered all three! But it’s worth knowing going in about the coercive control (however well-intentioned) and dubious consent, which is not really examined. There’s an extent to which I can roll with that (The Scum Villain’s Self-Saving System is calling) but I think one still has to look at it and admit that it’s problematic.

N.B. Since writing this review I read the light novels, and actually ended up posting those reviews first! You can read those reviews here. Tl;dr summary: I preferred the light novels and felt that the relationship was more explicitly mutual there.

Rating: 3/5 (“liked it”)

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Review – The Butcher, The Baker, The Candlestick Maker

Posted October 12, 2025 by Nicky in Reviews / 4 Comments

Review – The Butcher, The Baker, The Candlestick Maker

The Butcher, The Baker, The Candlestick Maker: The story of Britain through its census, since 1801

by Roger Hutchinson

Genres: History, Non-fiction
Pages: 352
Rating: four-stars
Synopsis:

At the beginning of each decade for 200 years the national census has presented a self-portrait of the British Isles. The census has surveyed Britain from the Napoleonic wars to the age of the internet, through the agricultural and industrial revolutions, possession of the biggest empire on earth and the devastation of the 20th century's two world wars.

In The Butcher, the Baker, the Candlestick Maker, Roger Hutchinson looks at every census between the first in 1801 and the latest in 2011. He uses this much-loved resource of family historians to paint a vivid picture of a society experiencing unprecedented changes.

Hutchinson explores the controversial creation of the British census. He follows its development from a head-count of the population conducted by clerks with quill pens, to a computerised survey which is designed to discover 'the address, place of birth, religion, marital status, ability to speak English and self-perceived national identity of every twenty-seven-year-old Welsh-speaking Sikh metalworker living in Swansea'.

All human life is here, from prime ministers to peasants and paupers, from Irish rebels to English patriots, from the last native speakers of Cornish to the first professional footballers, from communities of prostitutes to individuals called 'abecedarians' who made a living from teaching the alphabet.

Roger Hutchinson’s The Butcher, The Baker, the Candlestick-Maker proves to be not just “the story of Britain through its census”, but also the story of the census itself, about which I knew comparatively little. It was fascinating to read about the development of the census, the difficulties with implementing it, and of course the findings.

Hutchinson chooses some examples at times to illustrate his point, though sometimes he must either be making it up or going far beyond the census data in his discussions of some people’s lives. I found it really fascinating to explore the impact of events like the Potato Famine, emigration to America, the Highland Clearances, and of course the World Wars: it’s pretty much what you’d expect, but the census data makes it starkly clear. Hutchinson also has an interest in the charting of the decline of the non-English British languages, which I enjoyed.

Overall, at times it feels a little bitty — and like so many of these books, I feel it’s a history rather than the history, and another story might be told from the same data. But I found it interesting, and a surprisingly compulsive read, though the bibliography is worryingly thin.

Rating: 4/5 (“really liked it”)

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Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Posted October 11, 2025 by Nicky in General / 30 Comments

Welp, that sure was a week! It felt weirdly both fast and slow… but it’s done, and now it’s time for the weekend and lots of books. Right?!

Books acquired this week

This week saw the arrival of a couple of preorders, some longer-awaited than others…

Cover of Love in the Palm of His Hand vol 2 by Rinteku Cover of Mockingbird Court by Juneau Black Cover of All of Us Murderers by KJ Charles Cover of Death in Ambush by Susan Gilruth

I only read the first volume of Love in the Palm of His Hand a week or two ago, so I was lucky the next volume was out so soon! But I’ve been waiting a while for Mockingbird Court and All of Us Murderers, and I’m excited to get round to them.

And of course, there’s also my British Library Crime Classics subscription book for the month — I’d forgotten that was due to arrive! It’s a Christmas mystery, so I’ll probably leave it until December, though.

Posts from this week

First off, let’s do the usual roundup of reviews:

And a couple of other posts, the usual features:

What I’m reading

It’s been quite the week for reading, in part due to trying out some more manga — as usual, here’s a sneak peek of the books I plan to review soon:

Cover of Paladin's Hope by T. Kingfisher Cover of Continental Crimes ed. Martin Edwards Cover of Hold Back The Tide by Melinda Salisbury Cover of Into the Dark by Jordan L. Hawk

Cover of So Far So Good by Ursula Le Guin Cover of Glass Town by Isabel Greenberg Cover of The Genius Myth by Helen Lewis Cover of Love in the Palm of His Hand vol 2 by Rinteku

Cover of Loving You When the World Ended by Gene Cover of Mockingbird Court by Juneau Black Cover of The Light Conjurer by Gene Cover of Love Everlasting vol 3 by Tom King et al

I did also read one or two others which I’m not planning to review (e.g. Jordan L. Hawk’s Rattling Bone, which was a reread that I’ve reviewed here before), so it really was a busy week.

For this weekend, I’ve got a few plans. It’s Bookshop Day UK, and I’d like to be able to get a couple books to support local bookshops… but I still have my self-imposed cap of 20 books bought in 2025 and not started, and I’m currently on 19. I just started Eating to Extinction last night, which I’d like to read more of, and maybe I’ll dig into KJ Charles’ new book, and find out how I feel about The Disabled Tyrant’s Beloved Pet Fish. If I like it, maybe I’ll get the rest of the series to celebrate Bookshop Day!

Either way, I will as ever be following my whim.

Linking up with Reading Reality’s Stacking the Shelves, Caffeinated Reviewer’s The Sunday Post, and the Sunday Salon over at Readerbuzz.

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Review – Missel-Child

Posted October 10, 2025 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Review – Missel-Child

Missel-Child

by Helen Tookey

Genres: Poetry
Pages: 71
Rating: two-stars
Synopsis:

According to the seventeenth-century herbarium The Garden of Eden, a 'missel-child' is a mysterious being found beneath a mistletoe-covered tree - a changeling, perhaps, 'whereof many strange things are conceived'. Helen Tookey's first full collection of poems starts from the missel-child to explore archaeologies of identity, place and language. She is a formally inventive writer, using collage and syllabics, exploring elegy and myth. The poems in this book create a space in which language enables something to be said and also to be shown.

I hadn’t heard of Helen Tookey’s work before; Missel-Child, apparently a first volume, was a random choice at the library (I like picking random poetry I’ve not read and giving it a shot, since it’s never a huge time investment, and the library’s really the best way to do that).

I liked the glimpses at what sparked some of the poems, and some of the turns of phrase, but I finished it feeling pretty untouched by it… it just slid by without sinking any barbs in, despite liking the way it was written.

I’d give Tookey’s work another shot, but I wasn’t in love based on this experience.

Rating: 2/5 (“it was okay”)

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