Book 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

Elysian Fields, Suzanne Johnson

Received to review from Bookbridgr! Although I would normally hate jumping into a series in the middle, this doesn’t seem to be a bad point to do so. There’s a fair amount of exposition to get you settled in the world and up to date with the events of DJ’s life. It slides along pretty fast, and got me hooked because I really, really wanted to know what happened regarding a certain event in the first few chapters.

What drove me slightly nuts was working out who DJ was will-they-won’t-they romancing with, and which of them had the best chance. I was quite cringy at the early scene with Jake, the loup garou, because of the whole creepy (though admittedly so) “I can sense your fear and I like it” thing. That might’ve come off better with a bit of character history, but perhaps not.

Overall, this is pretty fun, and New Orleans makes a good setting for it. I’m not wildly in love, though, and I won’t be picking up the other books unless they appear on the library shelves and beckon (which is always possible).

Rating 2/5

Sarah Canary, Karen Joy Fowler

I do not know what to make of this book. I suspected I wasn’t going to enjoy it, since I haven’t enjoyed other stuff by Karen Joy Fowler, but that’s not exactly what happened. I did get caught up in the story, intrigued by the mystery of Sarah Canary. At the same time, I felt like it was one of a type of novel I don’t get on very well with, something very opaque, where motivations aren’t clear and things just happen to the characters as if they are just giving themselves over to whichever way life pushes them.

Not that there’s anything particularly wrong with that kind of story, it just doesn’t really do anything for me. Well, I’m sure there are exceptions, but this wasn’t one — the best I can say is that I read it very quickly, I had no intention of stopping, and I did find it interesting. Partially because of the genre-twisty is-this-SF question about it, rather than because of it — ambiguous stories don’t bother me, but the combination of style and character here did.

On the other hand, I did like the portrayal of B.J. For all that he’s clearly “not all there” in colloquial terms, he’s good at heart and the way he sees the world makes for an interesting point of view. The passages from his point of view were maybe the best in the novel, for me.

Rating: 3/5