Paints a lovely picture of life in colonial Malaya, gorgeous illustrations of the people and the society; I love the way she wrapped in ghosts and spirits from folklore. The main character is a drip, though, which is a bit of a letdown since her circumstances are so very interesting: a rich family is trying to marry her off to their extremely dead son, who is creepily courting her in her dreams and is not taking no for an answer.
Category: quick reaction
Crosshairs, by Catherine Hernandez
A near-future dystopia in which a racist, ultraconservative government in Canada (working with a similar government in the US, we’re told, but this story is set in Toronto) rounds up basically anyone who isn’t white, straight, or able-bodied, cuts off access to their financial accounts and transportation, and either straight-out executes them or stuffs them into concentration camps and workhouses. The narrator, a queer femme drag performer, is writing letters to his lost love while on the run and getting involved in the rebellion. It should have been exciting stuff, but the writing is super heavy-handed and the characters often pause in the middle of tense moments to deliver long-winded monologues about intersectionality and allyship. In general I found this really clumsily done, from the unlikely setup, to the extremely flat characters, to a really forced ending.
Driftwood, by Marie Brennan
A dreamy and thoughtful collection of interconnected short stories, told to one another by lost souls. Basically Driftwood is a place where worlds go to die: after some kind of cataclysm, people find that their world is now a fragment of itself, smashed up against other dying worlds, each world gradually diminishing until they disappear in the crush of other worlds. In such a place, you cannot hang on to your past life; if you do not wish to disappear with your world, you must become a drifter, homeless until death. Without permanence, the only foundation that the drifters are able to build are the stories they tell one another.
The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration by Isabel Wilkerson
I learned so much from this book. I knew that there was a migration of black people northward from the Jim Crow south but I had no idea of the vast scale of the migration, and only a vague sense of the challenges the migrants faced along the way. Wilkerson follows three real-life people, who made the journey at different times and to different places; she illustrates the challenges that they face and show evidence of how others faced similar trials. I particularly liked her assertion that these migrants were similar to first-generation immigrants to the country from other countries, in their drive to sacrifice and succeed despite all odds, in marked contrast to how they were depicted in society at the time.
Dark Rise, by C.S. Pacat
Comes off as a pretty standard fantasy story, in which the Light’s Chosen One is a child on the run from the forces of Dark. The really good action-packed beginning is severely blunted by an exposition-heavy worldbuilding middle (seriously, I feel like the author could have done better here), then it gradually ramps up again to a climactic final battle with the miniboss (you don’t take on the big boss at the end of the first book of a trilogy, after all). The book got much better towards the end, which featured a twist that I really enjoyed. Unfortunate that the second book isn’t remotely out yet.
All Systems Red, by Martha Wells
The Murderbot Diaries had been recommended all over the place and the praise is well deserved. I really liked the self-named Murderbot, a security cyborg AI provisioned to a planetary exploration team. Murderbot managed to hack into its controller module to gain its freedom… and proceeds to carry on doing the bare minimum required by its job while binging on entertainment serials in its spare time. (So relatable!) Despite Murderbot’s general antisocial tendencies, it finds itself trying to take care of its assigned humans as things around them get suspiciously dangerous. Murderbot is a super adorable character, the humans around it are well-sketched, and the plot moves really well. Next few books on hold!
Razorblade Tears, by S.A. Cosby
Oh man I am not sure what to make of this. On one level it’s a super fun ride, with two old dads, one white and one black, who go on a violent mission to avenge their two murdered sons; the writing is slick and enjoyable, there’s some great social commentary, and the character building is solid. On the other hand, I really don’t like that all the dads’ best character growth comes about because their gay sons were murdered. (This is not a spoiler, it is literally the first chapter.) Can we please not go around casually murdering the gay kids for character growth, it makes me sad.
Aru Shah and the End of Time, by Roshani Chokshi
I finally gave into the kid’s wishes and read one of his books, and this is SO charming. It’s basically Percy Jackson, except it’s based off of Hindu mythology. Aru Shah is an insecure, mouthy teen, constantly exaggerating (or outright lying) to put herself in the best light, and I liked how this character note was presented both as a weakness and a strength. Aru meets another girl named Mini, and the two discover that they are both Pandavas reborn, needed to defeat the demon that Aru accidentally awakened while trying to impress her friends. The writing is a bit precious but the jokes are genuinely funny; it works for the middle grade level, keeping the tone casual even as the themes get a little heavy.
A Stranger in Olondria, by Sofia Samatar
This book took forever (months) to read. The prose is incredibly lush; you drown in run-on phrases choked with beautiful adjectives and long inserted quotes from imaginary writers. For me it was too much to take in any one sitting and so I had to dip into it, intermittently, as I would a book of poetry. It’s like sifting through hay to find the needle of the plot, but basically a book-smart spice merchant gets haunted by an illiterate ghost who needs him to write her life story; unfortunately, he has traveled to a country in which haunting is forbidden, and needs to find allies to help him finish his quest. For all the gorgeous descriptive writing the plot moved agonizingly slowly, not picking up till the very end.
A Psalm of Storms and Silence, by Roseanne A. Brown
A little too precious in parts, but in this book Brown does a slightly better job in letting her characters drive the plot instead of making it feel like the characters are being shoehorned into a particular arc (which was the major problem with the book before this one). I like that this book is all about consequences; when humans betray each other, the consequence is a lack of trust; similarly, when very significant magic is done, an enormous price must be paid.