Category: Books

April in Books

~ Veselin ~ 6 Comments

I read some good books in April, and some I won’t remember.

Best

  1. Mickey7 – a Silo-style sci-fi, where settlers live inside a struggling habitat and are surrounded by ice and hostile aliens. It was short and on point, getting extra points for keeping the story contained. Overall, a clear 5*, and recommended here. Edward Ashton is on Bluesky and saw my post 😀
  2. City of Stairs by Robert Jackson Bennett – Robert Bennett comes up with very complex fantasy worlds. In City of Stairs, the Gods have been defeated and temporarily withdrew. The main character is like Adjunct Tavore, bravely facing them off when they attempt to creep back in.
  3. Death and a bit of love by Alexandra Marinina – Kamenskaya will chase her most obscure murder case so far. I guessed who the murderer was this time but it was overall a great crime story. It was very confusing and not at all clear, despite my good guess.
  4. Pawn of Prophecy by David Eddings – I awarded this epic LOTR-style fantasy with only 3 stars. It is very foolish and full of tropes. But it is interesting and I’m slowly reading the next chapter on my phone so it might not be 3* after all.

Worst

  1. Law of Gravity – I gave it 5/5 but I have no memory of ever reading it, no idea who the main character was, and what happened. So, a special point for pointlessness
  2. The Mermaid Singing (Tony Hill & Carol Jordan, #1) – A horror story that tortures some victims but mainly the reader.

Mickey7 by Edward Ashton, Book Review

~ Veselin ~ 3 Comments

Mickey is a colonist on the wrong planet. It’s cold and icy, and also inhabited by the metal-eating creepers. His only advantage is that he can be respawned, if the colony considers his respawn worthy the loss of calories. The cold and icy planet doesn’t provide much food sources, so everyone is hungry. Respawning might not be a priority.

Quite a terrible situation for the 7th iteration of Mickey but it gets worse when he survives to only discover that Mickey8 has already been spawned, without him being dead. Having two copies of the same person is considered a mortal sin, punishable by death. The twin Mickies will have to figure it out.

This is supposed to be a distant future space opera, but it felt like a post-apocalyptic thriller in the world of Silo. Either way, it is a fantastic sci-fi. A creative person in a terrible situation. 5/5.

This is also the 12th book from the Nebula series I finish. I might be able to read the whole series, if I only have the bravery to start Children of Ruin.

City of Stairs by Robert Jackson Bennett, Book Review

~ Veselin ~ 1 Comment

I started my review of the last book by comparison to other books. I’ll start this with a quote.

I learned very early on not to speak to my folk from on high, but to get down with them, beside them, showing them how to act rather than telling them. And I suggested that they should do the same with one another: that they didn’t need a book of rules to tell them what to do and what not to do, but experience and action.

Robert Bennett builds not just a fantasy world but a wisdom system for his series. It doesn’t need to be correct, to be appealing.

The gods were killed 80 years ago. With their deaths, most of their miracles vanished as well, including a large number of buildings from the sacred city of Bulikov. Eighty years later, the gods are forbidden. They can’t be mentioned, studied, hinted, their religions practiced, and the leftovers of their miracles cannot be used. People pretend they never existed, or at least most people.

Someone is breaking these rules. A top spy, the mighty Shara, is sent to Bulikov to figure out the conspiracy. Who killed the expert of the divine past, Efrem Pangyui? Why? Why do miracles still exist?

Dense and likable characters, a rich world, and an endlessly long ending, just like The Tainted Cup. Would I have been able to read this book if I hadn’t read The Tainted Cup? Unsure. But it’s a clear 5*/5 and a great fantasy. Ending with a quote as well.

Forgetting… is a beautiful thing. When you forget, you remake yourself… For a caterpillar to become a butterfly, it must forget it was a caterpillar at all. Then it will be as if the caterpillar never was & there was only ever a butterfly.

March in Books

~ Veselin ~ 5 Comments

I read some nice books last month. After a boring February, March brought me some cool thrillers. Not necessarily great but interesting for other reasons.

Best

  • The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett – this was the best read for the month by a wide margin. A beautiful story in a beautiful hardcover print. It inspired me to look for other books by the same author and I’m currently reading City of Stairs. 5/5
  • Exit Strategy by Lee Child and Andrew Child – there was a hint of the former Reacher in this story, which awarded it 4/5. I’m very surprised that this, from all the books, is what I remember as the second best story for the month.
  • The Missing File by D.A. Mishani – an intimate story about a detective from Tel Aviv who will find the path to the truth for a missing person’s report. The storytelling is quite unorthodox, which made me give it a 5/5.
  • The Revenge of the Damned by Chris Bunch and Allan Cole – an interim end of the Sten series. There will be another end later on after the emperor resurrects but I’ll probably skip that one because the story became too grim. I am looking for less stressful reads. 4/5
  • Killman Creek by Rachel Caine – a horror I wouldn’t like to remember. 4.5/5
  • The Edge by Lucy Goacher – “nobody believes me” type of story, right at the bottom of the list but still fine. 4/5

Worst