Reviews and Comments

This was an excellent book. Jemisin manages to take an already well-established setting, the "mythological" New York, and take it to new heights with surrealist magic and eldritch horrors. A diverse set of characters lead the story as the avatars of the five boroughs of New York and it's really neat to see them embracing who they are and interacting with each other. Thanks to a fast paced plot, I finished this fairly quickly and kept wanting for more as there are some tantalizing mysteries left out in the open. I was presently surprised to hear in the acknowledgements (yes, I read those too) that this is the first of a trilogy. Looking forward to more books in this strange new universe!

For a full review, check out my blog: strakul.blogspot.com/2020/04/book-review-city-we-became-by-nk-jemisin.html

This was a lighthearted novel with a funny, if somewhat incompetent, set of characters in situations way over their heads. It has the typical humor you see in other Discworld novels which leads you shaking your head wondering how a society like this could exist. It was good fun, though the light-ness of it felt very out of place when I was reading news. In hindsight, a more engrossing novel that kept me thinking far into it would probably have been better.

Check out my full review on my blog: strakul.blogspot.com/2020/04/book-review-guards-guards-by-terry.html

This was an incredible book to read and I can see why it's being praised so highly. I though the characters were great and I wanted to learn more about the individual Houses and what made them unique. The plot was very engaging as well and I raced through the last hundred pages or so. I look forward to the next in the series, which I understand is coming out in June of this year, and I highly recommend it for fans of either fantasy or science fiction.

For my full review, check out my blog: strakul.blogspot.com/2020/03/book-review-gideon-ninth-by-tamsyn-muir.html

This was a great book that was very fun to read. Very lively characters and engaging plot all set in a refreshing fantasy setting that breaks from the European tropes. The magic was exciting, yet not overbearing- at the end of the day the story is about the relationship between the four main characters and how that ties to the greater geopolitical struggles they find themselves in. The novel also wraps up very neatly making this a good standalone book, though I wouldn't mind reading other stories set in this world!

For a full review, check out my blog: strakul.blogspot.com/2020/01/book-review-steel-crow-saga-by-paul.html

I'm a fan of Sanderson and this is a classic Sanderson novel. Good characters, intricate setting, and a racing plot. One of my favorite things about his books is how he sets up a mystery for the characters to solve and effectively encourages the reader to do the same. Yet somehow, he always manages to stay one step ahead of me- I always think I know what the 'answer' is yet at the end, I'm always proven wrong and the real answer is far more interesting than what I expected. This happens again here and in hindsight there is plenty of cleverly hidden foreshadowing that would be rewarding to look through in a re-read.

For a full review, check out my blog: strakul.blogspot.com/2020/01/book-review-starsight-by-brandon.html

This was quite a good book, with lots of grand topics and epic feats as ordinary people struggle against the forces of nature. It has a decent set characters, though it changes part way, and there is no single main character across the whole story. In typical hard-scifi fashion, a lot of time is spent describing scientific concepts, such as orbital mechanics or genetics. I was OK with this, but your mileage may vary.

For a more in-depth review, check out my blog: strakul.blogspot.com/2019/07/book-review-seveneves-by-neal-stephenson.html

This was a great book. It combines an interesting historical period with some magic and strong character-driven stories. I was fascinated by the historical aspect and kept trying to guess or find out what the various nations and people were supposed to represent. Although I can't say I'm an expert of the late 1400s, I still was able to see the main historical players at the time and could research the rest. Of course, none of this is required to enjoy the story, but for me it was an added bonus.

For a full review, check out my blog: strakul.blogspot.com/2019/04/book-review-children-of-earth-and-sky.html

Overall, this is a nice, short book that further continues the story of The Interdependency. In my opinion, it's not as good as its predecessor though it has its redeeming moments. I wish the characters or the plot were a bit more complex, but at least the setting gives me many things to think about. Even though it started slow, it certainly picked up pace in the later half of the book and ended with some epic scenes.

For a full review, check out my blog: strakul.blogspot.com/2019/02/book-review-consuming-fire-by-john.html

This was a very enjoyable read. I approached it as a standalone novella, yet was surprised to see it's a full length novel (~500 pages) and the first in a series. This means there's more cool things to see in this world. It's among the few Sanderson sci-fi works I've read so it's good to see he can also excel here as he does in fantasy. The characters were cool (especially the ship!) and the plot, though at times predictable, is paced perfectly. This will be a series to look out for.

For a full review, check out my blog: strakul.blogspot.com/2018/12/book-review-skyward-by-brandon-sanderson.html

Very interesting ending to the trilogy. It felt like it had an extended epilogue since the main climax happens early on, but this was actually quite satisfying as it allowed us to see lots of threads wrap up and discover even more about the universe that Binti lives in.

If you've been reading the series, I recommend you finish it by reading this book. It wraps up several of the overarching plot lines and brings closure to many character stories. This series is a bit of an odd one for me. Despite classifying it as fantasy in my blog, it isn't quite that. It has elements of fantasy, but it's more grounded in reality. Yet it's not magic realism in that way either; if anything, it's its opposite: magic without fantasy. This is a book about magic and fantasy for fans of neither, for fans of contemporary fiction that have little to no idea about speculative genre fiction and have no strong interest in pursuing it. It's nevertheless, an interesting and engaging read, and this final book is probably the best one in the trilogy.

See a full review at my blog: strakul.blogspot.com/2018/11/book-review-magicians-land-by-lev.html

An great continuation in the Binti universe. This one really feels like a second part of the story and ends in a bit of a cliffhanger, but otherwise it was good to see more of Binti's experiences as she struggles to accept who she is, who her family wants her to be, and who she is becoming.

An excellent collection of hard sci-fi stories from Liu Cixin, author of The Three Body Problem. Lots of really interesting concepts and themes are explored, ranging from alien contact, technology, exploration, and the end of the world.

See my review on my blog: strakul.blogspot.com/2018/06/book-review-wandering-earth-by-liu-cixin.html