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| 9781620072011
| unknown
| 4.22
| 89
| Dec 19, 2016
| Dec 19, 2016
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really liked it
| "It's going to be fine. Assuming we survive."Alright, this proves it: Dorian Lake is a trouble magnet. All the man wants to do is train his new appre "It's going to be fine. Assuming we survive."Alright, this proves it: Dorian Lake is a trouble magnet. All the man wants to do is train his new apprentice and find his dislocated soul, and maybe make a living from his job as a hex-maker and his new gig as a bar owner. But fate--or knowing Dorian, it's probably karma-- just refuses to cooperate. Instead, he finds himself promising to help out his apprentice's brother with a nasty curse and finds himself embroiled in a nasty string of mysterious jinxes that threatens to bring the Presidium-- the governing body of American magicians-- right down on his head. As he puts it: "The Presidium's about to go on a tear. Last time that happened, we got the Red Scare. Before that, Manifest Destiny."Oh, and the demon he sold his soul to before it went walkabout is asking for a new deal while there's still time to make one. If you're addicted to urban fantasy and looking for a Dresden Files analogue, then in some ways, this could be a good fit. There's a less-than-thriving magic business, a basement where magical experiments are conducted, a young and attractive apprentice that the narrator has an exasperating tendency to salivate over, and even the extreme overuse of a few catchphrases. (Ever since I read the Dresden Files, I've winced every time I've read "arched an eyebrow" or "shambled." In the Dark Choir series, on the other hand, there are far too many "sniffles," "grumbles," and "smirks," usually when words with a neutral connotation are more appropriate.) On the more entertaining side, both have a protagonist who eschews technology because of magic's ability to "put a whammy on electronic devices", and even a detective from "Special Investigations," a unit I'm pretty sure exists only in Canada and the world of Harry Dresden. I found Wren, this series' answer to Charity Carpenter, a lot more likeable. There are also many distinctive worldbuilding, from the far more secretive Presidium to the practice of geomancy to the weird world of the stregha. This book, in particular, greatly fleshes out the shadowy Presidium, dipping into an enjoyable early American alternate history. However, despite all of the similarities, I found the tone radically different, both darker and more (intentionally) morally ambiguous than anything the Dresden Files can serve up. To start with, the magic of Dorian's world is a hell -- if you'll pardon the pun-- of a lot nastier. The powerful stuff ranges from chaos magic to Netherwork -- curses powered by the demonic "Dark Choir" -- to scary forces channeling the nastier aspects of nature. Dorian's magic is primarily hexwork based on what he blithely describes as "karma." Don't get me wrong; it still has its fun and silly moments--my favourite involved the magical properties of smiley faces-- but all of that moral ambiguity add a hell of a lot more suspense to the brew because the reader is left genuinely concerned about whether Dorian will slide off the moral event horizon. I found the plot itself somewhat problematic because of its tendency to completely drop subplots at arbitrary moments, but this additional moral suspense kept me simultaneously engaged and frustrated. (view spoiler)[I don't even know what to make of the Presidium plot--it seems insane to me, but hey, I think the ringleaders probably were insane-- but I was quite irritated by the way the Ches/Ricky subplot was completely dropped. After Ches leaves, I think Dorian only mentions her a few times, and he doesn't seem even remotely preoccupied with her fate. (What a jerk.) Also on the list of "wtf, Dorian?" moves was bringing Edgar along on the suicide mission. (hide spoiler)] Both Dorian and his allies take actions that made me cringe, and I still don't know where the series is heading, or just how much of an antihero Dorian will become. It's something of a refreshing change from cookie-cutter UF. When combined with a mystery I found utterly perplexing, all of this made the book nearly impossible to put down. As for Dorian himself, he's still pretty much the guy you love to hate, but what I really appreciate about this series is that it is so very self-aware of the protagonist's flaws. The other characters continually confront Dorian with his general entitled, self-obsessed, obnoxiousness. They call him out in the way he talks down to everyone, the way he believes he deserves to win, the way he demands loyalty of others long before he grants it to them, the way he stumbles into situations he doesn't take the time to understand. One asks: "Why do you make everything about you when it isn't? And when it actually is about you, you make it about everyone else."So sure, Dorian is annoying and seriously flawed, but the novels don't try to convince us otherwise, which makes all the difference. Plus, there are the side characters. As in previous books, I have significant issues with the way women are characterized: they're all pretty much seductresses, naifs, or in the rare cases they do manage to gain power, they're depicted as animalistic. But hey, that's a criticism that is pretty much innate to the genre. Series staples Edgar and Wren make an appearance, as does Ches, the rather conflicted character of the last book, and Julian Bright, ex-politician-assistant and current bar owner. One character I was quite happy to see again was Reed Malosi, the guy Dorian kept calling "Penn State", and he has a much more central role here, and I love his character even more. In the increasingly overcrowded world of urban fantasy, J.P. Sloane adds some new elements. Despite much of the standard machinery, from a struggling business to a sexy apprentice, Dorian himself is unique, both in his own unabashed flaws and the risk that he'll genuinely go Dark Side. Although I don't say this often, I suspect the Dark Choir series would be quite difficult to read out of order, so if this book sounds intriguing, I'd suggest checking out The Curse Merchant first. If you're looking for a new UF series, the Dark Choir series is worth a look. I don't know where this series is heading, but I'm definitely in for the next book. ~~I received an advanced reader copy of this ebook from the publisher, Curiosity Quills Press, in exchange for my honest review. Thanks!~~ Cross-posted on BookLikes. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Feb 06, 2017
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Feb 13, 2017
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Feb 06, 2017
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ebook
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| 0425276007
| 9780425276006
| 0425276007
| 4.08
| 444
| Jan 03, 2017
| Jan 03, 2017
|
really liked it
| "Tonight we rise as one and change the world!"Bone Street Rumba. Half-Resurrection Blues. Midnight Taxi Tango. Battle Hill Bolero. From the titles "Tonight we rise as one and change the world!"Bone Street Rumba. Half-Resurrection Blues. Midnight Taxi Tango. Battle Hill Bolero. From the titles alone, it's clear how important an influence music is on Older, and his love of rhythm and texture can be felt through the pages. Sure, it's a story about ghosts and humans duking it out against supernatural monsters, but for me, the series is just as much about New York City, the backstreets and communities that half-dead Carlos Delacruz and his full-ghost and human friends inhabit, from the juxtaposition of layered history in the ghost world to creeping gentrification to chatty santeros to the clash of cultures on the city streets. In Battle Hill Bolero, the story really picks up its tempo. If you've read my reviews before, you probably know I'm somewhat cavalier about series order-- even in this case, I started with Midnight Taxi Tango (#2) and only recently went back to read Half-Resurrection Blues (#1). So please take my word for it when I say that this book simply won't work without the previous two in the series. (In fact, that realization, which occurred within the first chapter of this book, is the reason why I went back to read the first book.) Any discussion of the plot necessarily involves spoilers for the previous books, so consider yourself warned. After the slow buildup in the previous books in the series, the rebellion against the Council has finally reached boiling point. After a host of mutual misunderstandings, Carlos and Sasha are finally trying to work things out, complicated by the revolution exploding around them. Battle Hill Bolero is chock-full of battlescenes, and some of them are pretty awesome. However, I did find it surprising that, given the series' focus on exploring the humanity of the other characters, there was so little concern for the sanctity of the lives (or unlives, as the case may be) of the adversaries. This is a civil war that pits friend against friend and coworker against coworker. How did the fight against the Council become a fight against a faceless enemy? I also don't tend to find plotting to be Older's strong point, and this book was no exception. I never really understand why the antagonists--and some of the protagonists-- do what they do; their often contradictory actions seem to serve only the plot. (view spoiler)[One thing that drove me slightly nuts was Carlos's entirely inconsistent status as secret rebel. At one moment, they're looking for a traitor; at another, he's going out to a bar with them; at another, they offer him a job; at another, they're attacking his house. It was logically inconsistent and didn't even really drive the plot. The ngks were another issue. While it was gratifying to see all the pieces of the previous books come together, I have no clue how or why they got involved, and why anyone thought it was a good idea to employ the magical equivalent of a nuclear attack. And while it was interesting to finally find out what happened at Carlos's death, it was sort of a letdown. Honestly, the whole "murder their whole families" thing still makes no sense to me, particularly given that Carlos and Sasha had no idea who they were in their previous lives anyway. But the biggest issue was, of course, Flores. Other than to drive the plot, what was the motivation for all the insane actions he took, from sending them to the Web to starting a war against them to bringing in Caitlin? He was basically a plot device, and a shallow one at that. (hide spoiler)] I'm drawn to these books because of the vivid glimpses of New York that Older gives us, the diverse characters, not the plot or action scenes. And I absolutely loved some of the characters introduced here, from Kris the take-no-prisoners ghost to Red, a transgender pirate whose spunky spirit outlived his body by centuries, as well as old friends from previous books. And then there's the sheer love of language that imbues the story, and the sly situational humor that is such an integral part of urban fantasy. For example: "Meetings are Satan's way of balancing out all the beautiful things in the world, like music."We even get an enjoyable cameo from Shadowshaper as well as a few hints about the next mythological entities Carlos and the gang will encounter. Battle Hill Bolero is a watershed book for the series. It absolutely cannot be read without the other books in the series, for the plot is filled with an unexpected but gratifying symmetry. I'm not sure where Older will take the series next, but I'm definitely in for the ride. ~~I received this ebook through Netgalley from the publisher, Berkley Publishing Group, in exchange for my honest review. Quotes were taken from an advanced reader copy and while they may not reflect the final phrasing, I believe they speak to the spirit of the novel as a whole.~~ Cross-posted on Booklikes. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Nov 20, 2016
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Nov 26, 2016
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Nov 20, 2016
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Mass Market Paperback
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| 0857663267
| 9780857663269
| 0857663267
| 3.93
| 1,175
| Jan 01, 2013
| Sep 24, 2013
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really liked it
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None
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Notes are private!
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1
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Aug 17, 2016
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Aug 19, 2016
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Aug 21, 2016
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Paperback
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| 0857663240
| 9780857663245
| 0857663240
| 3.91
| 1,506
| May 26, 2013
| May 28, 2013
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really liked it
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None
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Notes are private!
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1
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Aug 15, 2016
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Aug 17, 2016
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Aug 21, 2016
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Kindle Edition
| ||||||||||||||
| 0857663208
| 9780857663207
| 0857663208
| 3.68
| 2,481
| Feb 25, 2013
| Feb 26, 2013
|
really liked it
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None
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Notes are private!
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1
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Aug 12, 2016
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Aug 14, 2016
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Aug 14, 2016
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Paperback
| ||||||||||||||
| 1682302911
| 9781682302910
| 1682302911
| 4.07
| 678
| Aug 02, 2016
| Aug 02, 2016
|
really liked it
| "Society is not going to change under your sledgehammer, Cathy."I genuinely can't explain what this book did or how it did it, but the day I finis "Society is not going to change under your sledgehammer, Cathy."I genuinely can't explain what this book did or how it did it, but the day I finished A Little Knowledge, I purchased the first book in the series and promptly started reading it. And when I finished the first book, I bought the second. And then the third. I finished the entire series in sequence, one after the other. For those of you who don't know me, it's hard to explain just how out-of-character this is for me: I basically never buy books, and I have absolutely terrible series staying power. Yet without doubt, Emma Newman has gotten more of my money than any other author this year. And I don't really know why. Because here's the thing about the Split Worlds series: it's insidious. When I read A Little Knowledge, I thought I felt lukewarm about it. As an inveterate and unashamed out-of-order series reader, when I tell you that this is not a good book to start the series with, please take my word for it. Newman may have a gift for worldbuilding and characters, but she has not yet mastered the gentle art of the recap. The Split Worlds is pretty complex and I had no idea what was going on most of the time. Yet I think that was part of the series' appeal. Basically, a long time ago, a cadre of sorcerers split the magic part of the world from the mundane. The fey were banished to Exilium, but they subvert and steal mortals and bring them into the Nether, an intermediate zone between the two worlds where time does not exist. These fey-touched act as puppets for their faerie lords, and their actions are patrolled by the Arbiters, mortals whose souls were dislocated from their bodies to prevent subversion by the fey. The world of the Nether is frozen in semi-Victorian English state, an endless stream of parties and dances and dinners, with women given no more agency than a pet dog. Into this grim situation blunders Cathy, a child of the fey-touched who ran away to the mundane world and started going to college before she was dragged back to the Nether. As even she realizes: "Cathy had the delicacy and insight of a cat with its head stuck in a box moving backwards to try and escape it, and she knew it."Cathy may not have chosen her circumstances, but she's determined to make the best of them, and, more importantly, to change them, both for herself and the other women of the Nether. Even as her efforts heighten tensions between herself and everyone she loves, Cathy remains steadfast: "But how will things ever change if I don't force them to?"When I first read the book, I found the circumstances unpleasant and in some ways pointlessly unpleasant, much in the manner of YA dystopians: the setup is so extreme that it doesn't correlate with the world that its readers would inhabit. It's about feminism and agency and self-determinism, but the level of inequality the characters experience is so utterly extreme that I see it as rather a waste of the reader's outrage and disgust. The women of the Nether are constantly prey to rape and violence, and if they don't obey their masters, they can be magically "Dolled, cursed, and Charmed into obedience." (view spoiler)[I found Will utterly creepy, and was mystified about how they had gotten together. As he thinks himself: "He wanted to claim her, possess her and take her fire into himself."The fact that it is a charmed choker is all too appropriate. As she says to him, "You want me to be someone I'm not. You want me to play the game, don't you? That's what you mean when you say you want me to work with you. You want me to stop being such a pain in the arse. But what you're really saying is that you want me to stop being who I am."(hide spoiler)] Suffice it to say that A Little Knowledge is a difficult read, and much of the moral outrage it generated felt anything but constructive. But perhaps the goal is to use extremes to highlight the problems found in a more nuanced way in our world. Apart from sexism, the book also confronts racism and rampant consumerism. Even leavened with Newman's sly wit, it wasn't precisely an easy or pleasant read, yet I was sucked in all the same. I was so driven to understand how the world worked and how the characters got to where they were that I promptly turned around and binge-read the previous three books. In some sense, A Little Knowledge is also a game-changer for the series, putting events into motion that are sure to have serious impact on the Split Worlds. I may still be perplexed as to why I found these books so compulsively readable, but definitely count me in for the next one. ~~I received this book through Netgalley from the publisher, Diversion Publishing, in exchange for my honest review. Quotes were taken from an advanced reader copy and while they may not reflect the final phrasing, I believe they speak to the spirit of the book as a whole.~~ Cross-posted on BookLikes. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Jul 28, 2016
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Aug 10, 2016
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Jul 28, 2016
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Paperback
| ||||||||||||||
| 0356505340
| 9780356505343
| 0356505340
| 4.23
| 6,551
| unknown
| Jun 23, 2016
|
really liked it
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Danger is looming, and it threatens to be "A fate four point two degrees worse than death."When Alex Schwartz took a lucrative job developing high fre Danger is looming, and it threatens to be "A fate four point two degrees worse than death."When Alex Schwartz took a lucrative job developing high frequency trading algorithms, he had no idea how literal his transformation into a bloodsucking vampire was going to be. In the world that Stross creates, higher mathematics open a gateway to Other Dimensions haunted by Lovecraftian beasties, including the V-symbiotes that invaded Alex's brain and gave him PHANG Syndrome (Person of Hemophagic Autocombusting Nocturnal Glamour), which, sadly, isn't yet covered by the Equality Act. Acclimatizing to his new job in the Laundry, the super-secret magical equivalent to MI5, is never easy, but Alex entered the trade at a particularly difficult time: as the number of humans and computers increases, intrusions into the Dungeon Dimensions become increasingly common. As Alex learns, "Training for the end of the world is an ongoing part of the job."Right now, most of the Laundry is focused on CASE NIGHTMARE GREEN, the apocalyptic eventuality where magical saturation causes Cthulhu and Azathoth and all their friends to converge upon Planet Earth. However, The Nightmare Stacks takes a break from the looming threat of GREEN to focus on a NIGHTMARE of quite a different colour. While the previous book took on superheroes, this one combines James-Bond-style shenanigans with yet another geeky fandom. I can't tell you which--spoilers--but I can say that the results are vastly entertaining. The Nightmare Stacks is a bit of a departure from the other books in the series because it has barely a mention of Bob Howard, arcane sysadmin and protagonist of most of the rest of the books. Personally, I was thrilled to get a new protagonist. Alex is a bit of a passive nebbish nonentity, but I found him rather more likeable than the Bob of recent books. The protagonist-- and NIGHTMARE-- switch makes this an ideal starting book for anyone interested in the series. (Apparently it depends heavily on The Rhesus Chart, but as I've not read it--it's the only Laundry book I skipped--and I got along fine, I think this would be entirely readable without the context of the rest of the series.) I did find the narrative style a bit odd, however; we're told this is Alex's journal, yet most of the story, including the Alex-POV sections, are told in third person. I admit to being a bit mystified by that. Alex, our hapless protagonist, has more on his mind than PHANG Syndrome. His new employers are sending him to the last place on earth he wants to be: Leeds, his childhood home, where he's Doomed to be dragged back into the infantilizing maw of his family's expectations."Alex's interactions with his family are so utterly cringingly awkward that they induced sympathetic winces from me, as did his amusing attempts to flirt with his love interest, who takes the MPDG thing to a whole new level. "Alex's experience of dating is similar to his experience of string theory: abstract, intense, and entirely theoretical due to the absence of time and opportunities for probing such high-energy phenomena."I thoroughly enjoyed the parts of the book that focused on the amusing mundanities of Alex's life, but like many of Stross's book, at some point, the content switched over to extremely graphic and disturbing scenes of battle and slaughter. I've never quite figured out if all the gore was intended to be funny. I certainly don't find them so, but the scenes are liberally swathed in dramatic irony and Stross is peculiarly detached from the slaughter. I suspect the familial scenes and war scenes will appeal to vastly different audiences, and that plenty of other reviews will be complaining about the aspects of the book that I adored. I find Stross reliably hilarious and The Nightmare Stacks was no exception. I adore urban fantasy and the way it mashes together the banalities of life with a genre-savvy take on traditional fantasy. Along with explaining how a salt circle traps mages and describing the intricacies of governmental PLAN PURPLE PEOPLE EATER, this book involves perhaps the most unique usage of a selfie stick I've come across. If you find Stross's unique combination of magic, maths geekery, Rube-Goldbergian bureaucracy, and bumbling spycraft as entertaining as I do, The Nightmare Stacks is definitely worth checking out. ~~I received this ebook through Netgalley from the publisher, Berkley Publishing Group, in exchange for my honest review. (Thanks!) Quotes were taken from an advanced reader copy and while they may not reflect the final phrasing, I believe they speak to the spirit of the novel as a whole.~~ Cross-posted on BookLikes. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Jun 23, 2016
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Jul 08, 2016
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Jun 23, 2016
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Hardcover
| ||||||||||||||
| 0356505316
| 9780356505312
| 0356505316
| 3.92
| 7,385
| Jul 2015
| Jul 02, 2015
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really liked it
| "Please allow me to introduce myself… "Please allow me to introduce myself…Meet Mo, a.k.a. Dominique, employee of the UK's super-secret black-ops magic organisation (they call it the Laundry), wife of Bob Howard (a.k.a. The Eater of Souls), bearer of a psychotically evil soul-sucking bone violin, and combat epistemologist. When Mo takes a trip to do a little glad-handing with the Deep Ones (aka BLUE HADES), she thinks she's finally going to get a bit of well-deserved R&R. But before she knows it, a tiny mistake has landed her neck-deep in trouble, and even worse, in bureaucratic paperwork. In Mo's world, the end is nigh, and all hell is beginning to break loose. As the barriers between our world and the Elder Ones of the Dungeon Dimensions break down, more and more people are gaining magical abilities. Magic is rationalized in the context of culture, and given the superhero craze, suddenly there are a disturbing number of people running (or flying) around in Lycra suits that may not precisely flatter them. And a series of mistakes leave Mo in charge of a brand-new superhero ops organization tasked with stopping the superhero singularity. To make things worse, there's a new supervillain Mad Scientist on the loose, and he he's leaving behind messages of the "Tremble, Fools, Before It is Too Late!" variety, and worst of all, the messages are printed in Comic Sans. I suspect that the most divisive part of the book will be the change in narrators from Bob to Mo. Personally, I strongly preferred Mo to Bob. She's introduced to us in the midst of an unjustified attack of jealousy, but once she gets past that, I really warmed to her. I've grown a bit tired of Bob, and Mo's spiky, sarcastic, vibrant personality revived the series for me. I also wasn't too surprised by their marital issues; intentional or not on Stross's part, I've never sensed any chemistry between Bob and Mo. (Since much of the series is a Bond spoof, there are quite a few obligatory Bond girls, and Bob doesn't really think of Mo when she's not around.) While the previous books in the series don't really defy their Bond roots in the sexism department, I thought Stross did a pretty good job with his female characters here. He even has a wonderful riff on the Invisible Middle-Aged Woman syndrome. (Sure, there's the obsession on Bob's past partners, but Mo's Bechdel test failure moment is actually called out in-book.) The plot itself is rather measured, dealing mostly with Mo's struggles to get her fledgling superhero team going. I'm pretty sure anyone who has dealt with bureaucracy will find it amusing. For me, however, the ending was a bit of an off note. (view spoiler)[ If I understand matters correctly, the combined incompetence of Mo and the Laundry causes thousands of deaths. If the Laundry knew what was going on--and the conversations with the SA certainly suggests that--why not go after the organization? They're not all-powerful. They're not even magic. Surely a bit of explanation, shock and awe, or, in the worst case, deaths would have solved matters. Also, I know I'm a pedant, but I'm a bit weirded out by the oath bit. We (the barbarian Americans) also have the "lawful" bit, but for us at least, "lawful" means that it has to pass the legislature and be part of the law--just because an executive said so wouldn't make it right or true. Firing upon unarmed civilians without cause is kinda not cool with the UCMJ. So what about an immoral order by a superior officer makes it lawful? And how on earth was there not a witchhunt against Mo? She was shown on live TV to be killing a mass number of people with an enchanted weapon she was known to own, and, presumably, control. I pretty much do consider Mo and the Laundry culpable, and that assessment includes the mitigating factors. And Mo made everything worse. She deduced nothing. She solved nothing. She acted as the puppet of everyone around her. She didn't even withstand Lecter and ends up requiring rescue. Again. Granted, that's what always seems to happen to Bob as well, but given the context, it was somehow worse here. The other thing that really, really pissed me off was the ending, when Mo meets up with Mr Patronising Git, aka Dr Armstrong. In the last paragraph of the book, he responds to her valid concerns that (a) she did more harm than good, (b) she's worn out with it, and (c) the Laundry is an untrustworthy organization with a patronising speech in which he pretty much directly calls her hysterical. And she apparently takes it. There are moments in the book when Stross's gender biases surface. Mo spends a lot of time jealously obsessing over Bob and the women who knew him, and there's quite a bit of the catfight vibe in the opening. I found it rather irritating, but sure, maybe some women are like that. But Stross's complete ignorance of a serious hotbutton is just a step too far. There's a proud and ongoing tradition of dismissing women as hysterical or overemotional. It's so common that these days, it's part of bias training. Yet the book ends with this arrogant git calling her overemotional and telling her she'll "calm down" and "regain her center" and think better of it all? Really? And you're going to end the book with that? I would have loved to give this book five stars. Up until the ending, I really thought it would happen. But between the too-neat cop-out and the blind sexism of the last paragraph, the end left a bad taste in my mouth. (hide spoiler)] As always, Stross is absolutely hilarious, and this time, you don't need a computer science degree to get in on the jokes. Some of my favourite quotes: "Yes, she's a blood-sucking fiend. But she's also a superbly competent administrator and has an MBA which I think you'll agree makes up for a lot of sins." "Scientific research is a bottomless money pit. You can approximate Doing Science to standing on the Crack of Doom throwing banknotes down it by the double-handful, in the hope that if you choke the volcano with enough paper it will cough up the One Ring." "Despair, dismay, disorientation, and delusion: the four horsemen of the bureaucratic apocalypse." Unfortunately, though, I don't really think it's possible to read this without the context of the previous books. I skipped only one (#5, The Rhesus Chart) and found myself quite bewildered by the references to recent events. I can't imagine how hard it would be to read this without some knowledge of the Laundry, the Eater of Souls, and CASE NIGHTMARE GREEN. However, if you're looking to give the series a try, I think you can start with #2 ( The Jennifer Morgue ) or #3( The Fuller Memorandum )--I did. **Note: quotes were taken from an uncorrected advanced reader copy of this ebook and may not reflect the final version. However, I believe they speak to the spirit of the book. ~~I received an advanced reader copy of this ebook through Netgalley from the publisher, Ace Books, a Penguin Random House imprint, in exchange for my honest review. Thank you!~~ ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
|
Jul 07, 2015
|
Jul 12, 2015
|
Jul 07, 2015
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Hardcover
| ||||||||||||||
| 1476794995
| 9781476794990
| 1476794995
| 3.62
| 1,796
| Jan 13, 2015
| Jan 13, 2015
|
liked it
| “I have a strict policy. No magic, no monsters, no supernatural clients. Ever.”So says Owl, ex-archaeologist and thief extraordinaire. Still trying to “I have a strict policy. No magic, no monsters, no supernatural clients. Ever.”So says Owl, ex-archaeologist and thief extraordinaire. Still trying to avoid the vampires that she managed to rile in a previous escapade, Owl is in no mood for a new job. However, she soon discovers that it’s really, really hard to say no to a dragon. It isn’t long before Owl is trying to navigate the tricky waters of supernatural politics while avoiding vampires, angry nagas, and a confusing romantic relationship. Without the help of her friends and allies, she’s all set to crash and burn. I have such mixed feelings about this book. On the one hand, I loved the Indiana-Jones-With-Extra-Magic-On-The-Side vibe. I loved Owl’s vampire-killing cat, Captain. I loved Owl’s snarky, quip-filled narration: “You know your sanity is in question when you find yourself in a two-way conversation with a cat.”Charish put together a fun world, an entertaining story, and an intriguing villain, and I absolutely adored the ending--specifically, the last sentence of the book. But certain aspects just drove me nuts. Like trying to enjoy a concert while the guy behind you is whistling “This is the song that never ends,” I found it really, really hard to concentrate on the fun parts. First, I can’t buy the worldbuilding. The basic idea is that even though the clues of magic are everywhere, the world hasn’t caught on because the International Archaeology Association (IAA) has carefully hidden the truth from the world. How, you might ask? Well, apparently they’re a paramilitary organization with spies and influence everywhere and the ability to reach any archaeological crime scene before the police. Why are they hiding the truth from the world? Well, apparently No One Can Handle the Truth-- well, no-one other than the IAA, and the site guards who are trained to deal with the monsters, and the people funding the IAA, and the universities that the IAA is “strangling”, and the archaeology students, and the antiquity experts. I don’t know about you, but in my experience, any secret kept by more than two or three people leaks pretty darned fast. Masquerade worlds usually function via society’s unwillingness to accept the strange, but in this case, (a) there’s actual hard archaeological evidence of the weirdness, and (b) somehow there’s a vast organisation whose entire purpose is hiding magic, which leaves me with (c) absolutely no idea why anyone would bother, other than plot convenience. Not even the conspiracy itself is consistent; for example, the postdoc Owl worked with “had been falsifying data to hide a supernatural mummy from our supervisor,” who must have been as well aware of it all as the archaeologists themselves. (view spoiler)[ The worldbuilding wasn’t the only massive flaming inconsistency. What’s up with the game? How can the game designers be utilizing a secret code that supposedly no-one has deciphered for thousands of years? And the ending is a hot mess. Why on earth lock Owl up separately? Why not at least leave her with Nadya? Oh, right. Plot convenience. (hide spoiler)] The other thing that drove me up the wall was Owl herself. Where to begin? As one might expect of an archaeology thief, Owl is not a good person. However, she combines duplicitous bitchery with an absolutely staggering measure of self-righteousness. Let’s start with her backstory, which Owl seems unable to keep straight. Owl sold her principles for a promise of funding and a cushy post, but since she was too stupid to get any guarantees, the university promptly reneged on its promises. For most of the book, Owl keeps harping on and on about how she left because “My conscience had gotten me thrown out of the university.” Uh, no. She sold her integrity--twice, by my count--and felt betrayed when she discovered it wasn’t as valuable as she had thought. So much for her honesty. Let’s consider her good nature. When Owl helps out a fellow grad student in desperate straights, she not only feels entitled to some quid pro quo and when he refuses her request, she starts threatening him. When Owl is double-crossed by one of her victims, she feels hurt and betrayed, whining that “Funny how when people’s lives are in ruins, they’re more than happy to associate with the likes of me. It’s after I fix everything that they suddenly recall I’m treacherous, unconscionable me. [...] No good deed goes unpunished.” That’s not precisely accurate. They remember she’s a treacherous, vindictive creep when she starts blackmailing them and/or setting up her little revenge schemes. (view spoiler)[The part with Marie is especially problematic. Owl’s reaction is to feel betrayed that Nadia is calling her on it: “I sure as hell didn’t appreciate my best friend throwing it in my face [...] after the week I’ve just had, this is about the last thing on the planet I need right now.”True, at some moments, the characters do call her on it: “You did have a choice. You always have a choice, but you never take responsibility for your actions.”I agree wholeheartedly with Nadya. Unfortunately, Nadya’s reaction is treated more as a fit of pique, and Owl’s actions as entirely forgivable. I don’t agree. (hide spoiler)] Now let’s consider her skills. Throughout the book, there’s an assumption that Owl’s talents make her irreplaceable, but I’m not entirely sure what those talents actually are. Owl’s “train wreck” logistics, her tendency to mouth off to everyone she meets, and her inability to “plan her way out of a lit and unlocked chest” become a running gag throughout the book. According to one of her friends, “You can’t help but do stupid things. It’s in your nature. It’s also what makes you the best at what you do.”Which makes me think that her valuable skill must actually be for fucking up. Admittedly, she’s absolutely spectacular at that, as well as roping in others to take her knocks for her. (view spoiler)[In the end, it’s Rynn who actually manages to retrieve the artefacts and Nadya who decodes and reads the scroll, so other than her idiocy and recklessness, what was Owl’s actual utility? A more minor pet peeve was Owl’s obsession with fashion. Owl makes a disingenuous pretense of being above fashion and complains about dressing up as one of those “things I do for a job.” But then she spends rather too much of the book shopping (snakeskin leather jacket, leather boots, Chanel jeans, Ralph Lauren jacket, Louis Vuitton something-or-others, etc., if you were wondering) and identifying and judging people by their designer labels (which apparently she can identify on sight.) Possibly I’m speaking from my own resentment as a fashion-blind t-shirt-wearing programmer, but that little hypocrisy really irritated me. (hide spoiler)] The book showed so much promise. I loved the writing style. I loved the ideas. I'm well aware that the issue is just me Taking It Too Seriously. I really, really regret that I couldn’t enjoy it to the full. I can still heartily recommend it to anyone of a more forgiving and tolerant disposition. **Note: this review is of an uncorrected advanced reader copy. While the included quotes may not reflect the final phrasing, I believe they speak to the nature of the novel as a whole.** ~~I received this ebook through Netgalley from the publisher, Gallery, Threshold, Pocket Books, in exchange for my honest review.~~ Cross-posted on BookLikes ...more |
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Dec 16, 2014
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Jan 11, 2015
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Dec 16, 2014
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Paperback
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| 0425269647
| 9780425269640
| 0425269647
| 3.64
| 1,996
| Jan 27, 2015
| Jan 27, 2015
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really liked it
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The Reawakening--the rebirth of magic in the modern world--has begun, but the world is still pushing the snooze button. Jim Schweitzer has his feet pl The Reawakening--the rebirth of magic in the modern world--has begun, but the world is still pushing the snooze button. Jim Schweitzer has his feet planted in the nonmagical world. He has a nice home, a four-year-old son, and a wife whose art career is beginning to blossom. He also kills people. Professionally. But when an assignment goes terribly wrong, Schweitzer’s life takes a turn for the weird. Suddenly, he finds himself in a world where death is no longer the end and where magic is a contagion that the U.S. government is determined to stop. In general, I’m not particularly fond of prequels. They tend to tell a story whose outlines have already been sketched in the “real” book, and most of the suspense is killed by the author’s need to paint within the lines, both in terms of plot and characters. However, Gemini Cell is definitely an exception. It takes place long before the events of Shadow Ops, Cole's other series in the same world. While Schweitzer runs into Shadow Ops magics such as Renders, Cole also introduces jinns: human spirits that can reanimate corpses and co-inhabit with the original soul. Gemini Cell takes place during the birth of the Supernatural Operations Corps, before magic is acknowledged, before the terms of “Latents” and “Probes” and “Selfers” have come into usage. But at the same time, elements of the future are present. From the government’s initial reaction to magic, the writing is on the wall. The big question of the Shadow Ops series is the balance between freedom and security, and that struggle begins in Gemini Cell. I originally became interested in Cole after reading his blog post on PTSD. This is, finally, the PTSD book. Several of the characters go through traumatic experiences that leave them hypervigilant, unable to find safety or reassurance in the world they find themselves thrown back into. There are also several beautiful descriptions of loss from characters consumed by grief: “She’d stopped going to the gym, whiled away the hours in front of her laptop, scanning emails she couldn’t bring herself to answer, watching her social media scroll by, a flowing current of a world that kept on turning as if nothing had happened, as if her life hadn’t been suddenly snatched away from her, crumbled into a lumpen ball, and handed back with a note attached that read, FIGURE THIS OUT. GOOD LUCK!” Characterization in Gemini Cell is much stronger than in any of the Shadow Ops books. Sarah, Schweitzer’s wife, is the most rounded and interesting female character that Cole has written thus far. At the same time, Gemini Cell kicks the graphic imagery and violence up about ten clicks. The horrific scenes were intensified by Schweitzer’s own nature. I couldn’t come to grips with the idea of a man seeing killing as a job or an art form, and found his belief that passionless professionalism somehow made his role more acceptable to be profoundly disturbing. Yet although he has the same worryingly rock-hard moral certainty as Cole’s other protagonist, Oscar Britton, I found him more likeable, even though I wasn’t sure I actually wanted to like him. Schweitzer thinks of himself as a warrior, a “paladin” whose wars are “sanctified.” Although it isn’t really explored in this book, I strongly suspect that later books will examine and challenge who is doing the sanctification, and how noble their motives really are. Schweitzer sees his cause as righteous, but he is also driven by a deep-seated desire to be special, someone his wife can admire and his son can look up to. As Schweitzer’s world is turned on its end, even he begins to wonder about his own nature. He is a weapon, but is he merely a tool, or something more? He fixes even more firmly upon his identity as a “warrior” and an artist of death: “It was in the killing that the SEAL distinguished himself from the enemy. Schweitzer killed with a professional’s precision, a cold calculation made holy by its service to his country’s cause. It was what made him an artist instead of a thug.”Personally, I don’t understand why “professionalism” somehow improves the “killing” bit. How does killing efficiently make him less of a killer? A trigger man? A murderer? Schweitzer’s definitions of “right” and “wrong” are certainly not mine, but that made the book all the more interesting to read. One of the things I like about Cole is the unreliability of the third-person narrators. Even if Schweitzer is currently assured in his own righteousness, that won’t stop the rest of the series from turning his beliefs upside down. This is hinted at in one of my favourite scenes: “Why do you call them bad guys?” she’d asked. If you're interested in trying Myke Cole and looking for a place to start, then Gemini Cell is the book for you. While it contains much more graphic violence than any other book so far, I think it also is a stronger novel than the start of the Shadow Ops series. I found Schweitzer's predicament to be especially interesting in light of the events of Shadow Ops, but I also think the book stands on its own, without any dependencies on other works.The story weaves in elements of thriller, fantasy, and even romance, and ties it together with some troubling questions about our world and our system. I can't wait to see where it goes next. **Note: this review is of an uncorrected advanced reader copy. While the included quotes may not reflect the final phrasing, I believe they speak to the nature of the novel as a whole.** Excerpted from my review on BookLikes, which contains additional quotes and spoilers that I was too lazy to copy over. ~~I received this ebook from the publisher, Penguin, in exchange for my honest review. Thank you!~~ ...more |
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1
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Nov 14, 2014
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Nov 20, 2014
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Nov 14, 2014
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Mass Market Paperback
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| 1616961716
| 9781616961718
| 1616961716
| 3.74
| 4,364
| Jul 21, 2014
| Aug 12, 2014
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it was amazing
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~4.5 I encounter quite a lot of episodic hard-boiled urban fantasy, and one constant source of entertainment (and aggravation) is wondering what happen ~4.5 I encounter quite a lot of episodic hard-boiled urban fantasy, and one constant source of entertainment (and aggravation) is wondering what happens to the minor characters after they are abandoned by the camera. Take the television show Supernatural. After the Winchesters roll out of town, what actually happens to Screaming Girl #1 who loses her father/boyfriend/girlfriend to an angry pumpkin man or psychotic razor-hands or grabby ghost? Or what about the bystanders who were unlucky enough to have a car on the street during Harry Dresden’s rampage in Dead Beat? (Imagine the insurance claims.) Or all those unfortunate churchgoing ladies in Mike Carey’s Vicious Circle? Certainly anyone who ran into a fey from the October Daye series would require counselling, but what, exactly, would one tell one’s therapist? We Are All Completely Fine explores the lives of the survivors of supernatural situations, but in a less absurdist fashion than other sorcerous self-helpers that I have encountered. The story begins from the perspective of Harrison, a nihilistic ex-monster-hunter, as he vacillates outside of a psychologist’s office, not quite ready to step inside and join a newly formed group therapy. Harrison might not have much faith in therapy, but then, this is a rather unique group, for each member has been touched by the preternatural: an apparently self-possessed but inwardly tormented housewife, an elderly man still fixated upon a childhood trauma, a young man who retreats into a world of his making, and a silent, enigmatic girl with haunted eyes. The novella is a little unusual in everything from perspective to structure. We Are All Completely Fine starts each chapter in first person plural, spoken as if by an unidentified member of the group, then switches to third person limited. I’ve only seen this style a few times, but I think it adds an interesting effect here, strengthening the sense of the group as a sentient entity in its own right. As one might expect, much of the novella is simply the slow unravelling of the characters’ stories. The psychological aspect is thoughtful without ever becoming pretentious, and I loved the occasional glints of humour. While some of the characters never quite became three-dimensional for me, others came to life. One of the surprisingly empathetic characters, to me, was Stan, the elderly amputee who lost so much that he turned his victimhood into his identity. He is a talker, but he uses his words, his stories and complaints and pleas for attention, as a shield. Unsurprisingly, my favourite of the bunch was the taciturn, saturnine, guilt-ridden, self-destructive Harrison. Harrison’s interaction with the psychologist are constantly entertaining: "She believed that people were captains of their own destiny. He agreed, as long as it was understood that every captain was destined to go down with the ship, and there wasn't a damned thing you could do about it."I was also amused by Harrison’s origin story, which involves a seaside town called “Dunnsmouth,” a name rather reminiscent of the classic “Innsmouth.” Given the basic premise, it’s unsurprising that the author opted for something of a kitchen-sink’d Lovecraftian magic, but there were a few creative touches that I adored. I was a little dissatisfied with the ending, which seemed too neat in some areas and slightly plotholed in others, but I think much of this was due to the constraints imposed by the length. In fact, the biggest drawback, in my opinion, was that it was a novella rather than a novel, but at least the short length meant that I was able to enjoy a reread. I would love to revisit the characters and world, and I have high hopes of a sequel (pretty please?). We Are All Completely Fine will not be a good fit for everyone; after all, its major theme is coming to terms with horror-movie-style trauma. There are some graphic scenes and extensive discussions of mutilation, and I’d definitely slap a trigger warning on it. However, if you’re looking for something a little different and with a psychological bent, I’d definitely recommend it. Excerpted from my review on BookLikes. **Note: Quotes are taken from an uncorrected proof and may therefore not reflect the final manuscript. They do, however, provide wonderful examples of the charm and mood of the book as a whole.** ~~I received this ebook through NetGalley from the publisher, Tachyon Publications, in exchange for my honest review. ~~ ...more |
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not set
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not set
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Jul 01, 2014
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Paperback
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| 1612184588
| 9781612184586
| 1612184588
| 4.28
| 7,705
| Feb 18, 2014
| Feb 18, 2014
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really liked it
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Someone is trying to send Nate Garrett a message, and since it's Nate, they're sending it with blood. When Nate receives a call from an old friend and
Someone is trying to send Nate Garrett a message, and since it's Nate, they're sending it with blood. When Nate receives a call from an old friend and arrives to find the friend rather messily murdered, he knows something is up. When the mysterious killers follow up with a well-placed bomb, it begins to get a little personal. Nate soon realises that the people after him have some connection with a case he closed over thirty years ago, a case that happened to involve both the magical powers behind Avalon and the pocket-dimension kingdom of Shadow Falls. Since that case left everyone involved either dead or imprisoned, Nate is left with more questions than answers, but he's still ready to enter the fray with aplomb: "You don't know what game they're playing." Although With Silent Screams is actually the third book in The Hellequin Chronicles, it was my first entry into the series. I can therefore say with assurance that the book works perfectly as a standalone. The set-up is a little like a cross between Kevin Hearne's Iron Druid and Jim Butcher's Dresden Files; like Atticus O'Sullivan, the protagonist of Iron Druid, Garrett is an ancient being living in a modern world. Like Harry Dresden, Garrett is an extremely powerful magic-wielder with a preference for wind and fire. However, McHugh is far more adept at constructing a millenia-old inhuman protagonist. Unlike Atticus, Garrett doesn't pepper the book with endless pop-culture jokes, and while his phrasing is modern, it is British rather than American. Garrett also has far fewer scruples about killing his enemies than most of the urban fantasy protagonists I follow. As he explains, "Like humans, some [sorcerers] have trouble taking a life and some don't. I fall into the latter. I'm not psychotic or evil or anything so damn melodramatic, I just don't have the luxury of second-guessing myself. If someone is coming to attack me or the people I care about, it's them or me. Simple. If they want to push something to that degree and they threaten a life, then theirs is now forfeit. ... if taking a life means people I care about are safe, then I don't think twice about it."Nate holds true to his claim. He has a tendency to divide people into "good" (aka "on his side") and "bad" (aka "not on his side"), and exhibits very little guilt about gruesomely dispatching the "bad" folks. Despite my general dislike of amoral protagonist, I thought it worked surprisingly well, especially given that Garrett is a 1600-year-old Hellequin. Early on, I realised that it was rather like reading a book with Kincaid from the Dresden Files as the protagonist. I have a weird fondness for Kincaid, and that carried over to Garrett. Part of the attraction was Garrett's sardonic and often black-tinged sense of humour: "There is nothing you can do--" The magical world was only sketchily defined, but I found several aspects of it quite satisfying. As far as I could determine, most magic-wielders are either sorcerers or alchemists. I found alchemy, which provides the ability to alter or transform various materials by touch, to be rather ill-defined and highly variable in power from moment to moment. Nate, too, showed huge volatility in power level; in one moment, he's taking out a house of monsters; in the next, he's being dominated by a novice. However, there were plenty of aspects I enjoyed, such as the casual mentions of historical figures. For example, representatives from the magical world are always sent to have a "first meeting" with new leaders. Teddy Roosevelt apparently seriously considered shooting the magical representative, Nate desperately wanted to kill Henry VII (he liked Richard III and thought he didn't deserve all the bad press, and, as he says, "Charles II was an interesting one--I'm pretty sure he was either drunk or stoned for the entire meeting." The plot itself is enjoyable, if rather impressively gory. Initially, the chapters alternate between the present and flashbacks of the previous case, and I thought the device worked well. I also could have done without a certain amount of vampire-fueled wish-fulfillment and a discussion about "man cards" and "acting like girls", but all of that was definitely in character for Garrett. While there is some amount of mystery, Garrett has a frustrating tendency to fail to ask the obvious questions, so he usually finds the answers by stumbling into trouble. Garrett's version of thinking ahead: "Do you have a plan?"Most of the story is a series of non-stop battles. Most of the protagonists I follow are either low-power or exceedingly eccentric, so I found the more straightforward magic fights a refreshing change. I found Garrett's battle style, especially his use of flame and air, to be very reminiscent of Harry Dresden, so if you're looking for something similar, this series is definitely worth a closer look. Garrett also spends basically no time agonizing about the death he causes: "Will you kill them all?"If you're interested in action-packed urban fantasy and you're tired of angst and guilt, then The Hellequin Chronicles may be a good fit. As for me, I'm off to dig up the first in the series. ~~I received this ebook through NetGalley from the publisher, 47North, in exchange for my honest review.~~ Excerpted from my review on booklikes. ...more |
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not set
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not set
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Mar 02, 2014
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Paperback
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| 0385339151
| 9780385339155
| 0385339151
| 4.06
| 183,401
| Oct 31, 2006
| Oct 31, 2006
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liked it
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**edited 11/28/13 "Personally, I'd never had any desire to save the world. Decorate it? Yes. Save it? No."So says MacKayla "Mac" Lane, a blissful **edited 11/28/13 "Personally, I'd never had any desire to save the world. Decorate it? Yes. Save it? No."So says MacKayla "Mac" Lane, a blissfully blonde, beautiful, buxom bartender Barbie from Georgia. Of course, that was before her sister is murdered, left alone to die in a dingy alley on the other side of the world. Reeling from grief, Mac embarks on an ill-judged journey to Dublin, and her life of cheerful banality utterly disintegrates. Suddenly, the continued availability of Iceberry Pink nail polish is no longer the biggest worry of her world. For when Mac reaches Dublin, she discovers that fairies are real and that she is one of the rare humans who can see through their glamours. With her new vision, the world is a more frightening place: predators suck the life and soul out of unsuspecting humans, terrifyingly beautiful beings attack humans with deadly allure, and a mysteriously knowledgeable man seems to have his own subtle schemes for Mac. ...And that's all I'm going to post here. The rest of my (rather verbose) review is posted over here at Booklikes. Why? Because I strongly disapprove of GoodReads' new policy of censorship. (The link brings you to a summary of The Story So Far, which has facts and links so you can make up your own mind about the GR débâcle.) ~2.5 ...more |
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1
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Sep 10, 2013
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Sep 14, 2013
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Sep 10, 2013
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Hardcover
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| 0316079901
| 9780316079907
| 0316079901
| 4.13
| 4,111
| Mar 08, 2010
| Feb 01, 2011
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really liked it
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**edited 11/28/13 Something is wrong with the city. Spectres and Saturates (scum monsters) stalk (or squish) through the streets. There is writing on t **edited 11/28/13 Something is wrong with the city. Spectres and Saturates (scum monsters) stalk (or squish) through the streets. There is writing on the walls of London. The ravens of the Tower are dead. And Matthew Swift, somewhat-deceased, partially-possessed sorcerer, has been attacked through the very phone lines from which he draws part of his identity. When he awakens from unconsciousness, wounded and bleeding, it is to the realisation that the Midnight Mayor, mysterious protector of the city, has been murdered. But what with the disturbing entity calling itself the Death of Cities after him, he hardly has time to care about all the people from his own side who suspect him of having a hand in the Mayor's death. There is no way that I can write a review that adequately captures the world that Kate Griffin creates. (Honestly, I think this song--"Septimus" from the soundtrack of Stardust--with its quixotic uplifting tone and darker undercurrents, captures the story better than any words of mine.) I was floored by the sheer creativity of A Madness of Angels, and Midnight Mayor is just as fantastically inventive. The sheer creativity of the world is delightful: conjuring with ASBOs is largely ineffective, spectres can be trapped in beer bottles (you can drown anything in the bottom), and Tesco's receipts can be deadly. In the end, the darker mood was far outweighed by dry wit and extravagant imagination. This book made me smile, and that is too rare and wonderful to resist. ~4.3 Due to my disapproval of GR's new and rather subjective review deletion policy, The rest of my (rather verbose and quote-filled) review is posted over here at Booklikes. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Jul 26, 2013
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Nov 27, 2014
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Jul 26, 2013
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Mass Market Paperback
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| 1451698135
| 9781451698138
| 1451698135
| 3.48
| 1,846
| Jul 10, 2012
| Jul 10, 2012
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liked it
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**edited 11/27/13 ~2.5 I recently had a conversation with a non-native-speaker in which I tried to explain that American phrases are not the sum of thei **edited 11/27/13 ~2.5 I recently had a conversation with a non-native-speaker in which I tried to explain that American phrases are not the sum of their parts, and, in particular, that (a) telling a woman that she "really gets around" does not imply admiration of world travel, and (b) to "put out" doesn't mean "put" plus "out." He complained that speaking with Americans was extremely difficult: they speak fast, use colloquialisms, try to turn every remark into a joke based on some obscure reference or other, and are constantly waiting to throw in The Dreaded Pun. He said he found that the best policy was to smile, nod, and hope that the inexplicable laughter wasn't directed at him. After reading this book, I have gained a new sympathy for his point of view. Due to my disapproval of GR's new and highly subjective review deletion policy, the rest of my (long, rather cranky) review is posted over here at Booklikes. ...more |
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1
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Jul 27, 2013
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Aug 02, 2013
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Jul 03, 2013
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ebook
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| 0316093645
| 9780316093644
| 0316093645
| 4.14
| 3,392
| Jan 01, 2011
| Mar 24, 2011
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really liked it
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Matthew Swift, partially deceased sorcerer, symbiotic host to the electric blue angels of the wires, Midnight Mayor and protector of the city, is not
Matthew Swift, partially deceased sorcerer, symbiotic host to the electric blue angels of the wires, Midnight Mayor and protector of the city, is not an entity to be summoned lightly. But when he disappears in a blink and awakens in a conjuring of blood, it looks like someone has taken the chance. One perilous rescue, one fight to the death, and one burning building later, Swift's troubles have only begun. Oda, his sometime-enemy, sometime-ally, has been stabbed through the heart, but she seems determined not to go gentle in that good night. Lady Neon, queen of the newly reinvented urban faeries, and the Tribe, self-mutilating individualists, are calling for one another's blood, a sinister darkness is waiting at the end of every alley, parts of the city are vanishing from reality, and everyone seems to be expecting Matthew to Do Something about the situation. As always, Griffin's imagination is breathtaking. From the giant eagles that Matthew summons to rescue him from the fiery abysses of Sidcup, to the metal god of the underworld, to medical history reporting magical treatments from the NHS, Griffin's creativity is astounding. This is my fourth book in Griffin's London and I'm still floored by how many quirky, entertaining magics Griffin manages to introduce. One of the most marvelous aspects was the Neon Court: Once upon a time, in that old time when life was still magic and life was lived in the trees and forests and rivers and hills, in the old time of wild, ivy-tangled, rain-dropped magic, before the lights burnt and the spells flickered with electric fury, there existed the Faerie Court...But alas, the Faerie Court did not move with the times, and did not predict how a steam train could carve the landscape, or how a factory could discolour the sky, and, as the times changed, so did the magic, migrating with the people to the cities and becoming rich with smoke and stone and the sound of metal. And so the Faerie Court declined, and those who sought its blessing dwindled, until there was nothing more than a dusty hollow in the carved-out heart of a wood, crumbling with the fall of autumn leaves..[until] an enterprising princess...declared the founding of a new court: the Neon Court, whose heart was in the heart of the cities...And in time Lady Neon herself became little more than a myth: a figure only ever seen by the shadow of a street light, moving between city after city, forever chasing the night and avoiding the sun, a reveller whose lips could seduce any creature they touched.Those in the eternal quest for light and music and superficial beauty are contrasted with the Tribe, people who, seeing themselves as different from the rest of the world, seek to accentuate this divide via self-mutilation and self-augmentation until they are no longer recognisably human: "Once-humans, or humans that had cut away every outward sign of humanity, skin and flesh, in the hope that when they no longer looked human, they'd no longer have to obey human rules." Griffin explores the very human attempt to reshape the exterior in an attempt to redefine the self. As Matthew notes, both "thought the key to being perfect was to cut away the bad things." As both the Tribe and the Fey demonstrate, ripping away facets of one's exterior, whether in a quest for beauty or uniqueness, can mutilate and warp the interior as well until all humanity is gone. The plot follows the pattern of the other books in the series: Swift, aided by an (unfortunately all too disposable) snarky female sidekick, is pursued by an implacable supernatural foe. With the clock ticking and the city at risk if Swift cannot destroy the foe stalking him, he is forced into an alliance with distrustful, threatening, and morally ambiguous supernatural groups. The standard witty banter is still present, as Dees, Swift's Alderman ally, and Penny, his apprentice, are practically slot-in replacements for Oda and Vera. Several characters make their usual cameo appearances, including Sinclair, Charlie, and the inimitable and ever-entertaining Dr Seah. Griffin again tends to interject third-person interludes into the story, but despite the potentially dramatic content, I found these to be exposition-heavy and emotion-lite. The plot itself is quite twisty and satisfying, and the malevolent magic is genuinely shivery. Three books in, I'm still fascinated with Swift's character and the conflict between electric angel and dead sorcerer. In Neon Court, Griffin delves even deeper into the darker aspects of this peculiar fusion of personalities. While the brooding, sarcastic, depressive Matthew is reasonably typical for the genre, the electric angels are something else altogether, a heady mixture of wonder and delight and blazing passion and pride and fury. The electric angels are inherently amoral; they would destroy a city just to watch the dance of flames amongst the ashes. Griffin does a fantastic job in creating these dual aspects; the moments in which the angels take control are palpable, and not only because of the pronoun switch. When Matthew is overcome by strong emotions--pain, weakness, or bewilderment--the angels tend to step in with a ruthless simplicity. As he explains, I've got two kinds of magics. I've got the nice, sitting-at-home-not-troubling-anyone kinda magics...and we have the magics of fire and death, of destruction with no chance of return, of blood aflame and flesh turns to dust...which of us do you want to meet?There is only one aspect that the two personalities truly share: a tangible affection for the life within the city. Although dark throughout, the book is sprinkled with Griffin's trademark creativity and wit. Dees, Swift's new assistant, is particularly entertaining, as she manages a riposte in all of her verbal duels with Swift. Take her response to his attempt to angle for a complement: 'Mr Swift, if it's any comfort to you, I can promise you that were I not a happily married woman with a husband I love well,' sighed Dees,'you would definitely be in my top two genders of choice.' Of course, not all the snark and quixotic imagination in the world can lighten the tone when the blood starts flowing. Almost every named character dies, and by now, this shouldn't be a spoiler. In my opinion, Griffin's bloodbaths have hit saturation point: the deaths have become predictable, an aspect to be expected and endured. In every book, at least one of Matthew's female allies will be spectacularly murdered, conveniently driving Swift over the edge and allowing the angels to take control. As he notes in reference to the death of his friend Madness, "[Her death]..made complex things simple." This trick to send the villains over the Moral Event Horizon does indeed make things simple, at the cost of all the complexity and depth that might otherwise be explored. It takes more courage to keep your characters alive, to let their personalities and relationships develop and grow, to maintain the suspense without resorting to cheap tricks. Yet no matter how inured I was to my favourite characters' deaths, no matter how accurately I predicted their demises, events still left me with an aching throat. One unexpected delight of the book was the way in which it re-examined the events of A Madness of Angels. I've had Swift pegged as an antihero for a while, but it was interesting to see him try to reconcile his own motivations for pursuing Bakker. One of the other subplots of the book, the exploration of the "chosen one" trope, fits neatly into this theme. I have always been fascinated by the struggle between what is right and what is necessary, the extents and limitations of responsibility, and the role of choice and guilt in maintaining humanity. As one character remarks bleakly, "One has to prioritise when it comes to big feelings. One can only feel big feelings for so many people, otherwise one has to feel lots and lots of little feelings for lots of little people, and then frankly you'd stop being the hero." Perhaps this is the ultimate theme of the book: the struggle to define the line between hero and monster when both do what they think must be done. Overall, I cannot recommend this series too highly. Although I'm not thrilled with Griffin's decision to repeatedly re-isolate her hero and increase character turnover, there are too many wonderful aspects to these books to resist, from Griffin's incredible imagination to her laugh-inducing humour to her vibrant depiction of London. I've seen Griffin's writing aptly described as a "Marmite style", but if you happen to be a fan of her rather quirky, dialectic and dialogue-heavy stream-of-consciousness, please give these books a try. Excerpted from my (long, quote-filled) review on Booklikes , which contains additional commentary, spoilers, and quotes. CAUTION: READING PROGRESS UPDATES CONTAIN SPOILERS! ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Aug 27, 2013
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Dec 29, 2014
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Jun 22, 2013
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Hardcover
| ||||||||||||||
| 0316187267
| 9780316187268
| 0316187267
| 3.89
| 2,102
| Oct 25, 2012
| Oct 30, 2012
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it was amazing
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**edit 12/23/13: I ended up doing a reread. I'm keeping the first-read review here, but you can find the updated review at http://pagefault.booklikes.
**edit 12/23/13: I ended up doing a reread. I'm keeping the first-read review here, but you can find the updated review at http://pagefault.booklikes.com/post/7... . In a sudden, overwhelming rush of light and noise and music and emotion and knowledge, Sharon Li becomes an urban shaman. And just like that, it's gone again. But Sharon Li isn't one to wait on the universe; as a yoga-deep-breathing, self-help-reading, blue-haired optimist, she decides to take her problems to the internet. She sets up a Facebook group ("Weird Shit Keeps Happening to me and I Don't Know Why But I Figure I Need Help,"), which quickly becomes the Magicals Anonymous self-help meeting. Once a week, misunderstood necromancers, art-loving banshees, hypochondriac vampires, gourmand trolls, and hay-fever-hindered druids gather in a circle of creaky folding chairs and introduce themselves to a chorus of "hello's", then tell their stories to a sympathetic, tea-drinking audience. But Sharon and her motley crew aren't left to talk out their problems in peace. Souls are being stolen from the city, the Midnight Mayor can do nothing, and only an urban shaman can bring back balance. It would be a lot easier if all those supernatural monsters weren't after her, though... Hi, I'm Carly (Hello Carly) and I'm addicted to urban fantasy. So, yeah, I know there are worse things I could be addicted to--Starbucks coffee habits take a bigger bite of your budget--but it's becoming a real problem. See, I crave the stuff with originality and creativity and whimsy and imagination, and they're increasingly hard to find. Fortunately, Kate Griffin is here to feed my habit with stories chock full of urban magic, toothpaste-chomping goblins, and ninja builders. The light-hearted, quirky character of the book is reflected in its structure. Its short chapters, which tell Sharon's story from the third-person perspective, are each emblazoned with a vapid self-help platitude ("One Door Closes, Another Opens", "Reflect But Do Not Dwell Upon the Past", etc). These are liberally interleaved with mini-chapters in which each character introduces him/herself in extremely colloquial first person. I really enjoyed the structure; it might be a bit gimmicky, but the choppy chapters do a wonderful job in tempering Griffin's rather elaborate stream-of-consciousness prose and are an excellent fit for the mood of the book. As someone who hears character voices in my head, I found that the conversational style and slang brought the characters to life. One striking difference between Stray Souls and the Matthew Swift books, Griffin's previous series, is the overall tone. While the Matthew Swift books have a tendency towards earnest moralisation, Stray Souls is far lighter. Griffin doesn't try to leverage tragedies in the plot to delve into deeper moral issues, which I think provided a better fit for the eccentric characters and farcical scenes. Unlike the desperately unhappy Matthew Swift, Sharon Li is a very cheerful person, as she should be--she certainly works hard at it. Sharon is an inveterate self-actualiser; she practices deep breathing, repeats a catechism of self-encouragement to herself in times of trial, has a tendency towards evening classes and the self-help section of the library, and almost always attempts to be "nice." Most importantly to me, unlike the ever-isolated Matthew, Sharon is indeed a people person, and quickly collects a coterie of quirky sidekicks who may or may not be more trouble than they are worth; as she puts it, "Along with a bleeding druid, a wailing vampire, a toothpaste-addicted goblin, a gourmet troll and a socially inhibited banshee, not to mention there's this confused sorcerer who is not as much use as he should be, plus there's a hundred pigeons to round up. And if that weren't enough, my social life is a mess, my job prospects are nil, and I haven't got a boyfriend."From a quick glance at the reviews, I seem to be in the minority in liking Stray Souls as much or more than the Matthew Swift books, and the difference of tone seems to be a major flaw for many readers. The book still involves a relentless killer stalking the streets, but for once, the adventure isn't littered with the bodies of dead comrades (dead yes, comrades no). As someone who dislikes reading books in which the characters that I have emotionally invested in die horrific deaths, if someone has to die, I strongly prefer redshirts. Personally, I think Griffin has hit her stride: the less intense human tragedy better matches the whimsicality and creativity of the world that she creates. The only major flaw, for me, (view spoiler)[other than the contrived ending--seriously, weren't there better ways to get Edna killed rather than an ever-so-convenient afterthought during the villain's escape? (hide spoiler)] was the characterisation Matthew Swift. Swift, the protagonist of the earlier series, has become an avatar of the city and is now too powerful, too static, and too inhuman to be the main protagonist. While I applaud Griffin's decision to change focus, I don't think she quite succeeded in relegating him to the background. To limit Swift's involvement, Griffin made him both impressively incompetent and irritatingly cryptic. If you compare his pathetic excuses with his comments in Midnight Mayor, his hands-off policy is horribly hypocritical. Although I understand the story's need for such contrivances, I found him frustratingly rude and inept and found my emotional investment from the previous books quickly dissolving. My sense of alienation was accentuated by Griffin's tendency to refer to him as "The Midnight Mayor" or "the sorcerer" rather than "Matthew" or even "Swift"; I am always rather startled by the dehumanising effect of withholding a name. This book takes place after the Matthew Swift series, and while I would initially have recommended Midnight Mayor as a prerequisite to even understand what is going on, I'm not sure anything will make Matthew comprehensible. (NOTE: if you choose to read this before the Matthew Swift books, Griffin doesn't provide recaps, so here are the Cliff Notes:(view spoiler)[ --Matthew Swift is a sorcerer--that means he draws magic from a deep understanding of and connection to the city. Why doesn't that help with the situation here? Never really explained. Just roll with it. --Matthew also had a special connection with the lost voices of the telephone wires, spirits which call themselves the electric blue angels. --Swift was murdered by his mentor, Mr Bakker, after he refused to help Mr Bakker to use the angels to extend his life. With his last dying breath, he sent his spirit down the telephone wires to dance eternally with the electric blue angels. Bakker went on to murder most of the other magical practitioners in the city. --Two years after his death, Swift was brought back to life, but the electric angels came along with him. Now he's a weird medley of dead sorcerer and electric angel and has a tendency to refer to himself in first person plural. He rounded up a mini-army of magical allies, and killed Mr Bakker and took down his organization. --A while after that, the Midnight Mayor, protector of the city, was murdered by a supernatural being called the Death of Cities; the Midnight Mayor landed the job on Swift, possibly with the goal of getting Swift killed. The Aldermen, the servants of the Mayor, were not thrilled. Hence the little issues he mentions with his underlings. And now you're up to date on the events of Madness of Angels and Midnight Mayor! (hide spoiler)] Honestly, Matthew Swift comes off as an utter pillock, and now I'm dreading that the next few books will be Swift's journey from Annikin to Darth Vader--I can't quite believe that the personality switch is just the effects of seeing him via third person. (view spoiler)[The most problematic aspect, for me, was his use of the evil sorcerers as bait for the dog, and his complete insensitivity to their demise. (hide spoiler)] Maybe I just like the angels better than Matthew. I admit that I greatly enjoyed his presence: Swift has an almost Miles-Vorkosigan-like tendency to "happen to" people and I found myself laughing at the other characters' varied reactions to him. One of my favourites: "'Is that something to do with us, Mr Swift?' All of the characters--including Matthew--fall somewhere on the scale between engaging and disturbing, and I warmed to almost all of them. Although some, like the hypochondriac vampire Kevin, were on the stereotyped side, I liked most of Sharon's gang, from Rhys the tech support druid to the gentle troll Gretel. Not all of the magical misfits are exactly pleasant people--the necromancer is a dubious character at best, and I found the surly goblin more irritating than entertaining--but their flaws serve to make them more interesting. I think the book's character mini-chapters proved to be a very effective way of (literally) giving each character a distinctive voice.As usual, I felt quite a bit of unwilling sympathy for the villains(view spoiler)[, although in this case, I felt far more sorry for the wendigo than his human helpers (hide spoiler)]. I quite liked Sharon; outwardly rather ditsy, she is fiercely determined to "be the best she can be," which most definitely does not involve acting as a damsel in distress. Take her attitude on the subject of brow-mopping: "'You know that thing where the guy gets injured, heroically fighting off monsters and that? And then he gets all romantically feverish and kind of sexily sweaty and stuff? And then there's this girl who sits by him and mops his brow with cold water? I can't be having any of that. I just don't see how it makes any sense, because you know how the girl is usually 'Do I care?' at the start, and by the end is 'Wow I love this guy, he's needy?' I've never seen why I should come over all vapid for needy. Or, in fact, why sweaty is sexy. Sweaty smells.'" Yet again, the crazy antics creative worldbuilding plastered a smile on my face throughout. Although the book does have a few flaws, Griffin's fantastic imagination makes up for them.(view spoiler)[The scene (pp357) where Sharon talks down the guards was just absolutely amazing. (hide spoiler)] When I finished, I was wavering between 4.4 and 4.5, but the incident with the magical swarm of plastic bags flapping around like malignant jellyfish made up my mind: a 4.5 it is. So, anyway, yeah, my name is Carly. I'm naff at tea but I can brew a fair coffee. So, um, I guess I was just wondering--can I join Magicals Anonymous? I can bring the mugs. Note: I received this book through the Goodreads First Reads promotional program. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Jul 18, 2013
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not set
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Jun 11, 2013
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Paperback
| ||||||||||||||
| 0316133973
| 9780316133975
| 0316133973
| 4.14
| 165,976
| Nov 06, 2012
| Nov 06, 2012
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it was ok
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**edited 01/30/14 “Once upon a time, an angel and a devil held a wishbone between them. And its snap split the world in two." And the moral of the story **edited 01/30/14 “Once upon a time, an angel and a devil held a wishbone between them. And its snap split the world in two." And the moral of the story: Never underestimate the power of hope, true love, and assassination. I'm probably not the target audience: while I enjoyed Daughter of Smoke and Bone, I somehow couldn't perceive the depth and power others saw in the story. While I'm not one to partake of or even pick up on poetry, even I appreciated Taylor's lyrical language and evocative turn of phrase. Days of Blood and Starlight, as one might guess from the title, has all of the melodious language and rhythmic phrasing of its predecessor, as well as all of the worldbuilding and dark motifs. Unfortunately, I felt that certain aspects were not thoroughly considered, and two aspects hit all of my triggers: (1) glamorizing viewpoints that I found hypocritical, and (2) dwelling upon the details of certain atrocities in apparent fascination. ... Due to my disapproval of GR's new and highly subjective review deletion policy, I am no longer posting full reviews here. The rest of this review can be found on Booklikes. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Jul 2013
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Jul 02, 2013
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May 30, 2013
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Hardcover
| ||||||||||||||
| 0553817205
| 9780553817201
| 0553817205
| 3.97
| 3,190
| 2006
| Jul 01, 2007
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None
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Notes are private!
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1
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May 11, 2013
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not set
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May 11, 2013
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Paperback
| |||||||||||||||
| 0441019161
| 9780441019168
| 0441019161
| 3.31
| 2,779
| Jan 01, 2010
| Aug 31, 2010
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it was ok
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**edited 02/01/14 Sigh. I've now read at least one book in most of Simon R. Green's major series, and I think I'm going to give up. I find the concepts **edited 02/01/14 Sigh. I've now read at least one book in most of Simon R. Green's major series, and I think I'm going to give up. I find the concepts of his books tantalizing in general, and even though there's nothing I fundamentally dislike about his books, I'm just somehow the wrong audience type. Ghost of A Chance is an urban-fantasy action adventure story--basically what you'd get if you mashed together Ghostbusters with James Bond. HERE IS YOUR BOOK, SHOULD YOU CHOOSE TO ACCEPT IT. THE MISSION: Something has taken over the Underground. Commuters have been whisked away by ghost trains and terrible things have bubbled up from the deeps. Most of the commuters who could be salvaged are now sectionable. The Team's task: stop whatever is doing it, all the while avoiding the rival team from the Crawley Institute. ... Due to my disapproval of GR's new and rather subjective review deletion policy, The rest of this review can be found on Booklikes. IF YOU CHOOSE TO READ THIS BOOK, THIS REVIEWER DISAVOWS ALL RESPONSIBILITY. THIS REVIEW WILL SELF-DESTRUCT IN APPROXIMATELY 5e12 SECONDS. GOOD LUCK. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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not set
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not set
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May 08, 2013
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Mass Market Paperback
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my rating |
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| 4.22
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really liked it
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Feb 13, 2017
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Feb 06, 2017
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| 4.08
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really liked it
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Nov 26, 2016
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Nov 20, 2016
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| 3.93
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really liked it
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Aug 19, 2016
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Aug 21, 2016
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|||||
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| 3.91
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really liked it
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Aug 17, 2016
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Aug 21, 2016
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|||||
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| 3.68
|
really liked it
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Aug 14, 2016
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Aug 14, 2016
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|||||
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| 4.07
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really liked it
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Aug 10, 2016
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Jul 28, 2016
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|||||
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| 4.23
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really liked it
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Jul 08, 2016
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Jun 23, 2016
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|||||
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| 3.92
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really liked it
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Jul 12, 2015
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Jul 07, 2015
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|||||
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| 3.62
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liked it
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Jan 11, 2015
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Dec 16, 2014
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|||||
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| 3.64
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really liked it
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Nov 20, 2014
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Nov 14, 2014
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|||||
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| 3.74
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it was amazing
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not set
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Jul 01, 2014
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|||||
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| 4.28
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really liked it
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not set
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Mar 02, 2014
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|||||
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| 4.06
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liked it
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Sep 14, 2013
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Sep 10, 2013
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|||||
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| 4.13
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really liked it
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Nov 27, 2014
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Jul 26, 2013
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|||||
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| 3.48
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liked it
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Aug 02, 2013
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Jul 03, 2013
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|||||
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| 4.14
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really liked it
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Dec 29, 2014
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Jun 22, 2013
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|||||
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| 3.89
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it was amazing
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not set
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Jun 11, 2013
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|||||
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| 4.14
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it was ok
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Jul 02, 2013
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May 30, 2013
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|||||
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| 3.97
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not set
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May 11, 2013
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||||||
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| 3.31
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it was ok
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not set
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May 08, 2013
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