Reviews and Comments

The sequel to the high-pace Snare is a direct continuation of the first book, and gives us pretty much more of the same. It's also unfortunately pointing out more weaknesses here, that didn't bother me much in the first book, but annoy me now.

In any case, this is pretty much an Icelandic variation on Breaking Bad. We have regular folks here who have to break bad in order to survive. Mostly, our protagonist Sonja, who was forced to serve as drug mule so she can continue to see her son Tomas, but also Bragi, the customs inspector who wants to make sure his Alzheimer wife can spend her remaining days at home. And it gets wackier for Sonja who needs to deal with crazy Mexican narcos. Mr. José reminded me a lot of Tuco Salamanca in the Breaking Bad universe.

The novel is as fast-paced as the first one. Unfortunately, a massive amount of the story is wasted on the b-plot, which is about Agla and her financial transactions. I am pretty sure they'll fall on her feet in the final book, but for now they simply annoyed me because I found them boring. Agla is a very unlikeable character, I just don't know.

Ends with a note of happy end, so I am sure it'll all go to shit again in the first few pages of the final book, Cage.

It is really hard for me to understand why I goddamn love Abercrombie's writing so much. I recommended the First Law trilogy to my wife, and she kinda despised the hyper-masculine world of the First Law setting.

This book is no different. And yet. Abercrombie's not great with plot, but he's amazing with characters. This book alone brings a plethora of fresh characters we never met, or only in passing, and then the return of many previous characters, including the most tragic character in fantasy, Caul Shivers. All in all we get 6 point of view characters. 3 for the union: Bremer dan Gorst, disgraced King's Guard after the events of Best Served Cold, Finree dan Brock, Lord Marshal Kroy's daughter, pined for by Bremer, but monstrously ambitious for her young husband, and Tunny, a corrupt Corporal of the First. The 3 characters for the North are Curnden Craw, probably the most lawful good character of the series, always doing what's right, Named Man for Black Dow; Beck, a young man who wants to earn his name and comes to regret every moment of it, and Prince Calder, son of the fallen King Bethod, manipulative, cowardly and scheming as they come.

As a feminist, does it bother me that there's room for exactly one woman in the cast? Yep, sure does. Did this book fuel me through the worst of my COVID-19 infection? Sure did. What a page turner!

Set after Best Served Cold, Caul Shivers is now back in the North, working for the Black Dow. The Heroes covers a time span of 3 days, as the Union tries to take down Black Dow by a hill of statues called The Heroes. It's Abercrombie, so we are quick to learn there are no heroes in war. Also, war is awful. There's one long chapter on the first day of the fighting where we jump from one character to the next, each dying by the end of their paragraph, a seemingly endless stream of senseless death.

The end was a bit drawn out, but all in all, I was quite satisfied. I wonder what that says about me, as by reviews it's a bit obvious this is a testosterone-fest?

I wasn't initially sure about this novel but it quickly won me over, in this semi-autobiographical story of 13-year old Jason Taylor describing a year of his life in 1982, in 13 stories, one for each month of the year, plus an extra January. Each story is very different, and is teeming with the vibrant life of the 80s, picking up contemporary stuff like the Falkland war, Margaret Thatcher, and much much music.

Jason is a stammerer, which causes him much grief, so it's inevitably a story about school bullies for many chapters. Each story could stand alone and not lose much from it, but of course it's perfect that it weaves together. As usual with Mitchell, it alludes to previous books he wrotes, so there's Madame Crommelynck from Cloud Atlas, one of the more lyrical chapters of the book. It's really like listening to all of David Mitchell's doubts he must have had as a young writer.

I really enjoyed this book quite a lot.

I read this at breakneck speed, just like the novel somehow felt super-fast paced. It has very short chapters that just keep the ball rolling. Our protagonist is Sonja, a divorcee who does not have custody over her beloved son Tomas, and dreams of the day that she has enough money to file for custody. Money is a problem for her because she is in a 'snare'. Her divorce lawyer offered her a way to make money, by smuggling cocaine from Europe back to Iceland.

The novel has three main PoV characters: Sonja herself; her lover Agla, who is involved in a huge financial scandal. She also won't commit to Sonja as she is a closeted lesbian. And then there's Bragi, a customs officer who has spotted Sonja as a mule and is planning to catch her.

Sonja's snare gets tighter throughout the book, stakes are higher, and there are some twists. I didn't give it 5 stars only because the ending is rather abrupt, not even a good cliffhanger.

If you enjoy hardboiled crime, this is really really good.

This book was such a slow burn for me. Coming highly praised, I came in here expecting a traditional school of wizardry tale. But your HP it is not. It's good though, very good.

Told from first person perspective, our narrator is Galadriel, a sophomore at the Scholomance, a deadly place of education indeed. The students learn magic simply by surviving the many horrors the school throws at them. There are no houses or anything the like, but alliances to make sure you survive your senior year. Students have to fight their way out, through masses of monsters.

Galadriel is a loner though. Secretly, she's one of the most powerful magic-users of the school, but she can only use spells of destruction. As the story progresses, Galadriel has to make alliances herself, and figure out if she and the most prolific monster killer of Scholomance, Orion Lake, are dating or not?

You get zero exposition in the beginning, you're just thrown in, as Galadriel, called El, is saved by Orion. The magic system is a bit mind-boggling at first, and El is a bit of an unreliable narrator, as she's not super-likeable. She's an antisocial introvert. Takes time for her to thaw, took time for me to warm up to her.

It is a creative story, and it successfully breaks the mold of every other wizard academy story out there.

After my previous book, I decided that a slice of life fantasy book might just be the thing, and it really was. Legends & Lattes is low-stakes fantasy, with barely a plot but a huge chunk of coziness.

Viv is an orc warrior who is retiring from adventuring, and she wants to start a coffeeshop. She's brought a good-luck charm from her adventures, and then just builds it up, until she is the proprietor of Legends & Lattes. She gathers a cozy cast of characters who work for her, or learn to love coffee and cinnamon rolls.

Reading this book was like drinking a good cup of coffee and munching on a piece of pastry. Just comfy. It read a lot like a fanfic coffee house AU of a fantasy story, Viv might be freshly retired from a DnD party. But that's all not bad stuff. Sometimes we need something uplifting and cozy, especially in 2022. Just don't go in expecting an epic story, it won't be your cup of coffee.

CN: sexual harassment

I thought I had only read the first 6 books of WoT back in the day, but no, I was wrong. As I read this long-winded book where not much of anything happened in 800 pages, a lot of the stuff from Ebou Dar came back to me.

The good: I like Mat, I liked his Ebou Dar chapters, and the end of the book with the attack on Ebou Dar is very promising. I liked the machinations of the Black Ajah, and generally the intrigue and political stuff.

The bad: Incredibly lame pacing. My usual complaints about the author not understanding female relationships, or women in general, having created a wide cast of super-unlikeable women. Inherent mysogyny everywhere. I get that the author tried a power role reversal but it doesn't change that sexism is everywhere in this book. I mean, come on, Rand is fine with sending thousands of men to their death for him, but he recites the name of every woman in his head. Ugh. I could go on.

The very bad: I first read this in 1996, and I have come a long way since. I am not sure how the bit about Mat and Tylin slipped me by back then. Queen Tylin has her eyes on Mat, and soon her hands, and despite him saying no many times and avoiding her, she ultimately rapes him at knife point and he weeps afterwards. When he tells others about it as they accuse him of making passes at her improperly, he gets made fun of. As Mat is often a character that's used as a bit of comedic relief, being the fun gambler and womanizer, I have seen Reddit comments that just pass this off as a bit of fun and genius writing. I personally was shocked, and don't think it was handled sensitively at all. Not that I could really expect Jordan to handle such a subject matter with a deft touch. Oy.

Nevertheless, the overarching plot is keeping me hooked, and I will see it through to its hopefully not bitter end. Halfway done, 7 down, 7 to go. And I haven't even reached the low points of pacing yet.

This one is from the category 'WTF did I just read?' It's not my first book by Kameron Hurley, the queen of zero exposition ever. You just get thrown in, and the missing exposition, in this case because of amnesia, is part of the story.

Zan is a warrior from the family Katazyrna, and apparently the only one who can conquer the Mokshi, a world-ship that has left the Legion, a group of decaying world-ships and is supposed to be the salvation, as all other world-ships are dying. But Zan loses her memory every time she comes back from the Mokshi, and along with her amnesia, just like Zan you as the reader have to figure out what exactly is happening here.

We get two PoVs in this book. Zan, who remembers nothing, and has to regain her memories, and Jayd, apparently Zan's love, daughter of the Katazyrna leaders, who gives herself away in marriage to the rival Bhavaja family, in order to fulfill the master plan she's worked out with Zan before she lost her memory.

Zan's chapters are great, Jayd's chapters I detested, just like I detested the character. What I wasn't prepared for was the amount of body horror in this book. The world-ships are organic, and this case it means very visceral and disgusting. At some point, Zan gets tossed to the bottom of the ship and has to basically claw her way back up through the bowels. It was disturbing yet also my favorite part of the book. I could easily transplant this into a Numenera roleplaying campaign, it was delightfully weird, with a group of four adventurers traveling through the world.

The main Mokshi plot left me a bit cold though. It was interesting, but not as good as Zan's story on the Katazyrna. Also a bit disturbing, if strange pregnancies might make you queasy. I should mention that this story has female characters only, and conception is sexless, as women get pregnant and birth ship parts as the world ships need them. Yeah, weird, I know. But also interesting, because female autonomy over their bodies is HUGE in this story, and should be in RL too.

Anyway, not my favorite for sure, but interesting.