Odds and ends and ramblings

I have never before hit my CBR goal and then just stopped, but 2020 has sapped my motivation and willpower and wordpower. So these aren’t real reviews, but I did want to do a brief round-up of some of the books I’ve finished recently, because one was SO GOOD I needed to add my voice to the chorus of praise, and because one was SO disappointing I needed to growl about it for a sec. So here’s my Cannonball Lightning Round:

 

• So You Want to Talk About Race, Ijeomo Oluo
  • Read for my 99% surburban white lady neighborhood book club. The book was really well done; the book club discussion was not near as painful as I thought it would be. One woman in her 70s got teary and said, “I’ve lived a lot of life, and I thought I knew everything, and this book taught me so much.” Yay!

• Carnival, Elizabeth Bear
  • This is on my ‘finished’ list, but I’ve forgotten almost everything about it except a vague sense of annoyance. Sometimes my habit of buying any woman-written sci-fi at a used bookstore leads me astray, alas.

• Giver of Stars, JoJo Moyes
  • This was a present, and definitely not my usual pick. A lovely story about plucky lady librarians on horseback in the early 1900s. I think I would have liked it better at a less fraught time, but reading about a time of rampant sexism, etc. (“how DARE my WIFE want to have a JOB”) just made me tired. Tireder.

• Trading in Danger, Elizabeth Moon
  • The daughter of a well-to-do shipping family gets unfairly kicked out of a military academy, then goes on to become captain of her own ship and save the day while getting caught in another planet’s interstellar war. Solid, and I’ll definitely be reading more in this series.

• Gathering of Shadows, V.E. Schwab
  • Book two in the trilogy about magical Londons. A fun world with a mildly annoying protagonist (Lila, what are you THINKING?!?!?!). Halfway through the third book now.

• The Census-Taker, China Mieville
  • Okay. China. You know I love you. I found The Scar at a library book sale several years ago and have been hooked ever since. But what happened here? There’s no story. There’s no plot. There’s no ending. You’re being weird for the sake of weird with the writing, and it doesn’t help the story (which needed all the help it could get). This was easily one of my least favorites this year, and it hurts me to say that. I may have to re-read Railsea to restore my love. My image of you is totally blown.

• They Did Bad Things, Lauren Forry
  • Amazon says this is a “deviously clever psychological thriller.” It is not. It is unlikeable characters making terrible decisions, and a completely ridiculous resolution. Silly and skippable.

• Stone Sky, N.K. Jemisin
  • This one deserves its own review, and Essun and Nassun deserve better, but so many others have said so many lovely things, and they were all correct. The Broken Earth trilogy was my first introduction to Jemisin, but she’s going to be my new China Mieville and I look forward to tracking down and savoring everything she’s ever written. These books were so great, from the characters to the writing to the ideas to the world-building. They made me think and they broke my heart and they made me gasp. So so good, and I can’t wait to re-read the whole trilogy, now that I know the whole story.

• Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet, Becky Chambers
  • The Wayfarer series hasn’t really been on my radar, but I joined a sci-fi book club through my library and this was their next pick. It’s good! Some of it feels like a Very Special Episode of something teaching us how to get along with folks who don’t look quite like us (some aliens don’t have any bones, but they’re still worthy of respect!), and this first book definitely felt like a set-up for future books, but it was nice to spend so much time getting to know these great characters. And the book club is a good group – also fun characters!