User Profile

Amanda

amanda@bookwyrm.social

Joined 2 years, 8 months ago

This link opens in a pop-up window

Amanda's books

Currently Reading

Review of 'Hollowpox' on 'GoodReads'

5 stars

The series is really taking off now. It’s poignant and whimsical and funny. It’s got it’s own logic and massive urban fantasy world building of the kind that Harry Potter had, but it’s also apparent that we do books so much better now. It’s got queer representation, in the text (and subtext), that isn’t tokenised.

And best of all it’s doing interesting things with all the standard fantasy tropes: villains, magic, magical schools and good versus evil. I think this author thinks a lot more of her audience than previous children’s and YA book authors have, and that we will get much more sophisticated internal
politics than we would have seen in previous generations of works.

Also, this will be a great movie.

Jenny Oliver: Summer We Ran Away (2020, HarperCollins Publishers Limited) 1 star

Review of 'Summer We Ran Away' on 'GoodReads'

1 star

I do not understand how it’s even possible to write a book this bad. I think I lasted two pages, both of which contained references to BOTH Instagram AND WhatsApp, clearly intended to make the book feel current. They didn’t.

There’s something off with the language. Badly off. I don’t know enough about grammar to say what it is but the sentences don’t make sense to me.

I think this is the worst book I have read.

Erin Morgenstern: The Starless Sea (Hardcover, 2019, Doubleday) 4 stars

From the New York Times bestselling author of The Night Circus, a timeless love story …

Review of 'The Starless Sea' on 'GoodReads'

5 stars

It’s very good but I think Zachary would say it has too many side quests.

There’s something wonderfully perverse about a story this obsessed with stories. Like the distilled essence of one of those people who just loves tea and books, not to drink or read but as a part of their identity (and also to drink and read).

For whatever reason I miss Dishonored. It also has a shoutout to one of my favourite games in theory, Sunless Sea.

Leslie Kern: Feminist City (2020, Verso) 3 stars

Review of 'Feminist City' on 'GoodReads'

2 stars

I don’t think I learned anything new reading this. The book proposes or introduces no theory, and describes very little except the lived experience of the author, certainly never lifting its eyes to the broader picture. I understand the need to situate knowledge and all that, but this feels more navel-gazing and meandering than anything else. The book hasn’t given me any new way of thinking about urban planning that a basic feminist understanding and some common sense already gave me.

Still, it was a nice read.

Philip K. Dick: The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch (2010) 4 stars

The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch is a 1965 science fiction novel by American writer …

Review of 'The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch' on 'GoodReads'

2 stars

It’s a book and all but I just can’t get around how women are portrayed. They pretty much don’t do anything, and every scene that has a woman starts by describing how big her boobs are. Every time.

Sure, this might be a description of how the characters think, but why would literally ALL characters be incredibly sexist pigs? At that point the raw unpleasantness of the characters start to spoil the rest of the book.