Tag: book-review

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.

Nettle & Bone

~ Veselin ~ 1 Comment

Nelson Mandela once said that it always seems impossible until it’s done. This book is a fairy tale about an impossible adventure in which princess Marra seeks to help her sister. The sister is stuck into a forced marriage with a king who is torturing her. He is protected by an immortal and almighty fairy godmother and other less visible forces, like an army, and is untouchable. Marra will start a decades long journey where he’ll find support by people and entities with magical powers. Will they succeed on time? After all, a recurring theme in the book is that you can’t help someone who doesn’t want to be helped.

If I were to compare it to other books, Nettle & Bone is reminiscent of Uprooted by Naomi Novik and the first Witcher novel.

Nettle & Bone is an excellent little fantasy with a simple idea and a complex magical system based on millenias of superstition and fairytales. It’s written in a young adult style but covers adult themes like domestic violence. Not sure how to classify it. Fantasy, I guess.

5*/5

Defiant by Brandon Sanderson, Book Review

~ Veselin ~ 8 Comments

Defiant is the final book 4 from the Skyward series. The series has other works, written in cooperation with Janci Patterson, that can continue indefinitely but Defiant ends the whole thing. It’s reasonably translated as “Towards The End” in Bulgarian.

Skyward is about Spensa Nightshade, a teenage girl who wants to become a fighter pilot on a world that suffers a constant attack by alien drones. She has some special skills that develop over time, and she becomes one of the best pilots humans have ever seen. Her growth makes the first 3 books very interesting, although she gets nerfed from time when she faces new and more skillful opponents. I rated the first 3 parts with clear 5/5s and they were very enjoyable.

Book 4 is an exception and doesn’t get the full score.

You get all the wonderful world building, which is signature by Brandon Sanderson, his great storytelling and then you glue it with super-heroism and random nerfs to get this beautiful hardwood hardcover book spoiled. Spensa, who started the series as an underdog with a dream, is now comparable to strength to the Infinity Gauntlet Thanos. She practices instant no-energy teleportation and instant telekinesis of objects with unrestricted mass, can read minds, project herself elsewhere, and is likely immortal through respawning like a demon from Julie Kagawa’s Shadow of the Fox series. There are objectively no reasons for the book to last longer than 5 pages – Spensa can teleport the heads of her enemies 50 centimeters to the right and it would just end without her leaving her room. As if that was not enough, she’s in constant contact with two immortal, omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscient AIs.

What are all those overpowered characters fighting for in 460 pages? Their enemies deserve the highest honors for lasting that long by using trickery and deception. The TL;DR is that they fight with boxes.

I think the Skyward world is exhausted and do not expect a continuation but Brandon Sanderson is a genius and can come up with a problem difficult enough for his demigod characters to resolve.

I gave this book 5*/5 on Goodreads but it’s probably closer to 3.5*/5 due to the lack of balance in the force.

2024 In Books

~ Veselin ~ 4 Comments

2024 was the first year in which I managed to go over 100 books. This was a major achievement for me and a result of several circumstances:

  • I reengaged with the gamebook community, which is full of voracious readers (and writers)
  • I discovered the Thraxas and Stephanie Plum series that are super interesting and each book is short, single-thread, bubblegum-ish
  • A few of my friends were inspired to read a lot this year so I was not alone on this journey
  • I ignored several of the latest books by Brandon Sanderson, Joe Abercrombie, Zachary Pike, J.K. Rowling, Liu Cixin just because they were too long. Maybe I go back to these works in 2025. Or 2035. Not soon. Ignoring enormous books by otherwise great authors seems to be a good strategy. TL;DR.

Here are the best finds from reading 111 books and 36217 pages:

Best Series

  • Thraxas by Martin Scott – a Pratchett-style comic fantasy series, which I completed entirely in 2024. There are some hints of exploitation in the first 2-3 books.

Top 5 books

  1. We Are Legion by Dennis E. Taylor – Bob starts exploring the galaxy and the opportunities are endless
  2. Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel
  3. Kings of the Wyld by Nicholas Eames
  4. Conquer Yourself by Silvia Azdreeva
  5. All Systems Red by Martha Wells

Best Gamebook

Trends

  • Kobolds are everywhere
  • AI is human and should be treated as a life form (yet to find a book say otherwise)
  • Pretty covers sell well

2025

I’m not sure if I’ll try to keep the pace for 2025 yet. I’ll set an official goal to read 52 books, or 1/week for the year.

Jade City by Fonda Lee, Book Review

~ Veselin ~ 3 Comments

The jade city is a place where a small group of people can use the local high-grade Jade to obtain superpowers. Most people, including the foreigners, cannot use jade without losing their minds or can’t sense it at all. The power makes them greedy and hungry for more.

Two jade-controlling gangs are about to clash and break the long-lasting peaceful rivalry in the city. We’ll see the development of the conflict from the point of view of various participants – the old generation, the new generation, the power hungry, and the one who succumb to the greed.

Jade City, like many other POV books, introduces lots of context switching and is a slow read. My copy traveled to Blagoevgrad, Kyoto, and Lisbon until I finally completed it. It’s hard to say if all POVs served a purpose. I think most did.

4.5*/5 – I liked it but it took effort to complete.