Category: Books

The Book of Koli by M.R. Carey, Book Review

~ Veselin ~ Leave a comment

A post-apocalyptic world where trees have come to life and eat people. Something like a mix of The Mist, The Day of the Triffids, and the story of The Finisher Vega Jane. Koli is a kid forced by circumstances and ambition to take the path through the man-eating forests.

In King’s The Mist, the story ends before it even begins. In The Day of the Triffids, the triffids are completely harmless and only dangerous because all the people are blind. The Finisher is boring and lacks any intrigue. Koli is not boring, the story doesn’t end prematurely, and the trees are organized and man-eating, while the problems, in general, are unsolvable.

Of course, just like in The Girl with All the Gifts by M.R. Carey, none of the details in this story make any sense. If you want an apocalypse that is logical—this one isn’t. If you’re looking for a happy ending—that’s not possible. Everything ended a long time ago, and all the action is just ripples in a sandy desert where nothing living remains.

Despite that, The Book of Koli is at least a full star ahead of The Day of the Triffids and The Finisher, and that’s no small accomplishment. Koli has character and will probably make it at least 200 miles from the starting point, leaving behind a trail of blood and horror.

5*/5 – it’s only the second 5* book I read this month out of seven.

Rogue Protocol by Martha Wells

~ Veselin ~ 9 Comments

I got stuck with The Boy on the Bridge, a deeply uninteresting book by M. R. Carey. The more time passed, the less time I spent reading, and I ended up not reading at all for days.

A breath of fresh air in whole the reader block was Rogue Protocol by Martha Wells. As one of the Goodreads reviews says, the Murderbot can have a mission to rescue kittens and it would still be interesting.

Rogue Protocol is about finding evidence against the corporation GrayCris. Bot will go to a space station that’s haunted and scary, and it has no armor. We have some Alien moments but of course, Bot is no weakling. It’s clear who should scream in space.

If there’s one downside of the whole series, it’s that the books are so short. The top three are the ones published in Bulgarian. Their total volume is about equal to the red book under them, which is The Boy on the Bridge by M. R. Carey, which got me stuck.

I’m still stuck though. I don’t want to get back to the red book.

The Girl With All the Gifts by M.R. Carey, Book Review

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Zombies have wiped out humans, leaving scattered enclaves of survivors and rotting food supplies. A little girl is locked in a basement, protected from all the evils. It’s obvious that she’s extremely dangerous, and also maybe relatively ordinary. Like Pandora.

There’s a rule in nature—you can’t have your cake and eat it too. This rule is fundamentally broken in the book. What are the zombies doing to cause an apocalypse? Eating people or turning them into zombies? Pick one. Once a person is eaten, they cannot turn into a zombie because nothing is left. M.R. Carey doesn’t pick one and goes all-in, and then adds even more absurdity to the zombie mechanics. The final result looks like a movie script with scenes written to impress rather than to make sense.

The book is undeniably very engaging and interesting. Melanie is a highly likable main character. Easy 5*/5, and something you can read in one sitting. I’ve already bought the second part and plan to read it after a short break. The zombie mechanics, however, are so unconvincing that I took one star from the Goodreads review and ended with a fair 4*/5.

Retribution Falls by Chris Wooding, Book Review

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A fantasy world with multiple types of sorcerers, various races, demons, necromancers, and a living sword similar to Kamigoroshi and Nightblood. On top of all that, we have pirates, airships, and fighter planes. Almost like One Piece with aircraft. How cool is that?

Ketty Jay is a plane-aircraft carrier, though it’s more of a dirigible by description. The crew consists of fugitives, people with guilty consciences, or both. Over the course of 530 pages, we get to learn about their sins and weaknesses. Even though they are murderers, thieves, and generally unpleasant people, they somehow manage to stick together. Chris Wooding gives us one or two explanations for why that is, but overall, the crew’s loyalty probably needs more exploration in the sequel.

The captain of the Ketty Jay is Darian Frey. He’s a selfish smuggler and pirate who has the habit of making terrible mistakes. He makes a big one and the book is about his attempts to fix it. We will learn that this was not his first blunder, not even the biggest one. The blunder is that he trusted the wrong person who set him up for a trap. Frey is in a need of retribution. However, Retribution Falls in the book is some Tortuga-like pirate city that makes no sense in a world with fast-moving aircraft, and the Dorian Frey’s retribution is just a coincidence.

The book is long and feels a bit sluggish at times. I could only manage a few chapters at a time before it somewhat hooked me. After that, it was okay—still close to the kind of stories I tend to DNF.

I think a 4*/5 rating is fair for a unique world (5/5), a relatively original story, and a solid group of misfits weighed down by a bit too much detail and some plot holes (2/5).

I plan to read the sequel, but not right away. Currently reading another book by M. Carey and it sets the bar too high.

February In Books

~ Veselin ~ Leave a comment

I purchased lots of books in February but only read eight. The two best were the two that had been stuck on my unread shelves for months, if not years. I read them to clear space for other books and was pleasantly surprised.

Best

  1. The Fifth Season by N. K. Jemisin – I have to admit I purchased that because the book cover was pretty. The book itself was written in a strange way but it stuck and I think it was the best for the month, although the competition is close. The volcanic Earth where humans can cause earthquakes and volcanic eruptions is quite memorable.
  2. The Wisdom of Crowds by Joe Abercrombie – Abercrombie delivers a lot more of the same in both good and bad sense. The Wisdom of Crowds is mind-blowing but also 750-ish pages, 250 longer than the necessary to be my top pick for the month. Savine dan Glokta doesn’t disappoint.
  3. Nettle & Bone by T. Kingfisher – an excellent short fantasy with a simple idea and a complex magical system about domestic violence, curses, and fairy godmothers. Although a fantastic book and a clear 5*/5, the other two were more impressive. I’ll happily read other works by the same author.

Worst

  • Extremis by Barry Eisler – I gave it 4/5, 2 weeks later I’m ready to adjust it to a solid 3. It was clear what will happen from the first page, and it happened in a slow motion.
  • Operation Star Guest by Lubomir Nikolov – I read the flying saucer book from this post but unlike the other books by the same author, which I frequently award with 5*, this came as sloppy and rushed. We are on a mission to find a flying saucer and contact an alien civilization. What do we do? Worry about food because we didn’t pack any and how to start fire. Yeah, no.

Overall, a good month for reading with a total of 8, five of which got five stars.