Reading almost since I remember myself, now mostly listening. Sci-fi is love, as are fairytales, and strange beings and clever humans are what unites them.
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Arthur C. Clarke winner and Sunday Times bestseller Adrian Tchaikovsky's triumphant return to fantasy with a darkly inventive portrait of …
Epic fantasy is just not my genre. I love the characters. I love the magic systems. The politics is decent. The romance is sweet. Yet close to the end of the book I was tired of it and waited for it to be finally over.
After eighty years of fragile peace, the Architects are back, wreaking havoc as they consume …
I do not know how I feel about this book. I feel like my love for strangeness has finally met its match in that as soon as I listen to the events of this story, I forget them because I have nothing to relate them to. I feel like I should love the world of this book more for how different it is, but it kind of gets lost to me in all the action-packed-adventure on the one hand and being too strange to remember on the other. Honestly love that aliens are strange, and not just differently coloured humans. Now, if I can only remember what they are, I'll probably love and enjoy the next book too.
Not my typical listen, but I picked it up based on the cover and title (and the success of previous cover pickup, The Trees). It was tantalizing in that it probably did not contain magic, only superstition, but it did have a witchy vibe that I did like. Interestingly, the author's note at the end revealed that events, places, and people by those names really did exist, though how those things existed is completely fictionalized in the book. I don't know how I feel about that. In a way, that was this book's draw - as I started to read it, I felt like it was feeding my gossip cravings, but unlike real-life gossip, it will end up with a storified, satisfying ending, and it did. I would classify it as a bit of a guilty pleasure for that, but a very pleasurable one nonetheless.
After eighty years of fragile peace, the Architects are back, wreaking havoc as they consume …
Re-listened the first book before starting this one, as I didn't remember what was what, and still found it really enjoyable.
The trees arrive in the night: thundering up through the ground, transforming streets and towns …
Zaļā pasaka from I.Ziedoņa Krāsainas pasakas but horror, slightly. Also, has probably the most likable unlikable protagonist I've read in a while. I really enjoyed following the journey of the characters in the book. A bit too magical to feel truly post-apo, a bit too post-apo to feel truly fantasy. Really enjoyable listen (as I listened to it on audible).
I got disillusioned by the time I got to the appendices and did not finish this book, which is a bit of a shame since I think the appendices might be more valuable, maybe should have started reading from those but I'm very bad at not reading from start to finish. I picked this book up as I'm working in a job I quite enjoy in a field (gambling) I feel very uncomfortable with. I thought maybe this will give me either boost to change jobs or a reconciliation with working in a sus industry. Well, it just made me feel kind of worse about my abilities and didn't help. It made it a bit worse that by the time I had gotten stuck at the appendices, I learned that the "funny finance scam guy" that I'd been hearing about had been a prominent effective altruist. Sure, I shouldn't judge …
I got disillusioned by the time I got to the appendices and did not finish this book, which is a bit of a shame since I think the appendices might be more valuable, maybe should have started reading from those but I'm very bad at not reading from start to finish. I picked this book up as I'm working in a job I quite enjoy in a field (gambling) I feel very uncomfortable with. I thought maybe this will give me either boost to change jobs or a reconciliation with working in a sus industry. Well, it just made me feel kind of worse about my abilities and didn't help. It made it a bit worse that by the time I had gotten stuck at the appendices, I learned that the "funny finance scam guy" that I'd been hearing about had been a prominent effective altruist. Sure, I shouldn't judge a movement by the mistakes of a member, yet it does not help. I really hoped for some kind of practical guide of how to evaluate options or find jobs locally that match some values, but instead I feel like I got high level abstract advice mostly targeted at high-achieving people.
Every novella by Ursula K. Le Guin, an icon in American literature, collected for the first time in one breathtaking …
Every novella by Ursula K. Le Guin, an icon in American literature, collected for the …
There were several stories set in four or five worlds. The first one I liked, it was fairy-tale or fable like, but a bit more mundane, and that was cool. Then there was one that read like a long poem, not as cool as The Poet X but like, very much a vibe, though the vibe was oppressed women, imho, so did not like that one that much. Then there was some sci fi and I got excited, and I really enjoyed that one. There were several stories in that universe spanning several different times and places and each time a different protagonist made it feel very real because each protagonist felt real even though it was happening in a universe where accidental time travel and multi world coalition was possible. Enjoyed that one a lot. Then there were Erthsea stories, and I realized why I never liked The Earthsea …
There were several stories set in four or five worlds. The first one I liked, it was fairy-tale or fable like, but a bit more mundane, and that was cool. Then there was one that read like a long poem, not as cool as The Poet X but like, very much a vibe, though the vibe was oppressed women, imho, so did not like that one that much. Then there was some sci fi and I got excited, and I really enjoyed that one. There were several stories in that universe spanning several different times and places and each time a different protagonist made it feel very real because each protagonist felt real even though it was happening in a universe where accidental time travel and multi world coalition was possible. Enjoyed that one a lot. Then there were Erthsea stories, and I realized why I never liked The Earthsea Trilogy, because I don't like the world. It feels like it should be amazing because the magic system is really fantasy-trope-fundamental, and we hear about people doing their day-to-day things, yet it does not feel evocative and enchanting like Howls Moving Castle despite being in a world with magic but more like Straumēni - dull and depressing. (Apologies for the weird analogies.) And lastly, we're back on a spaceship again, and I thought this would be it, but again, no. I really loved the setup, the ideas behind it. However, the way it was all described somehow makes it feel duller than it should be. I feel like I'm constantly wishing for books to be more grounded and closer to realistic, and now that I got it am somehow unsatisfied with it. Eh. I'll just call myself a picky reader from now on.
An immersive, electrifying space-fantasy from Neon Yang, author of The Black Tides of Heaven, full …
Got this as my booksona and am genuinely intrigued. The Tor booksona quiz in question: www.torforgeblog.com/2023/03/12/get-your-booksona/
Every novella by Ursula K. Le Guin, an icon in American literature, collected for the first time in one breathtaking …
On a warm March night in 2083, Judy Wallach-Stevens wakes to a warning of unknown …
This book is confusing to me. It should be right my cup of tea because of the subjects, however it makes me slightly uncomfortable, like it's a bit to earnest or something. The premise is very silly (why do the aliens make it sound like it's all the humans or all is bad?) but somehow despite it the arguments it makes as a result feel pretty realistic (because if a mother with children jumps into abyss you try to catch her or at least her children), and even educational (I didn't know about values-based decision making before this book). Overall, not my favourite book even though I feel like I should like it better.
On a warm March night in 2083, Judy Wallach-Stevens wakes to a warning of unknown pollutants in the Chesapeake Bay. …
I got mislead by the blurb, I think, and discovered, that I'm not into fantasy questing stories. Even when written by authors I really like. The blurb mentioned that the heroes have slain the villain and now it's the land after the war they have to live in, or something like that. But it turns out that that just sets up the setting in which the quest is going to take place, there's no trying to get back to normalcy in the way I imagined it. There's even a climactic fight with the big baddy near the end or smth. Yeah, my bad, was not what I was looking for.
