A Hat Full of Sky by Terry Pratchett The second in the “Tiffany Aching” series. I read and really enjoyed “The Wee Free Men”. But I have to be honest: this one is not as good. Maybe because there’s not as much wee free men. No Granny Aching. Maybe because it suffers from “sequel syndrome” where, since her first goal was already accomplished, now the story struggles with achievements. It’s about Tiffany living with the witches, and now she has to go to “witch school”. She meets colorful characters, but suffers from annoyances and problems. Rather than something to achieve, to reach for. On Becoming a Novelist by John Gardner(unfinished)…
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The Books I Read: November – December 2013 (Part 1)
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick It’s definitely unlike the movie. I’ve complained before about Blade Runner, and that it’s all style and lacking cohesion. The book feels a little more satirical, a little more biting, and not so concerned about looking and feeling cool. It’s really steeped in allegory and metaphor and THE MESSAGE. It’s interesting how the director saw a movie in this. The portion that made it into the film is quite minimal. He probably could have saved some money by filing off the serial numbers. The book itself? Well, it’s hard to put an opinion on it. It’s a novel to be…
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The Books I Read: September – October 2013
Libriomancer by Jim C. Hines Jim C. Hines is good at set dressing, but less so with character + plot combos. I wish I could come up with overall ideas like him, but that’s about all I wish for. The story, like his other stories, are very linear and take all place in the immediate present with little thought to backstory or contemplation. I feel like his characters don’t drive the plot, events do. And the result is I don’t have much sense of character. No sense that this matters to the character personally, only immediately. So there’s no literary devices, no foreshadowing, no flashbacks, no Easter eggs, no moments…
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The Books I Read: July – August 2013
The She-Hulk Diaries by Marta Acosta I had high expectations for this book — a novel about a superheroine who usually doesn’t make it past the comic books. I was hoping that, since Jennifer Walters is a lawyer, the book would be about some courtroom drama, a la John Grisham, but with the added complication of superheroes. Despite it being The She-Hulk Diaries, She-Hulk is barely in it. It’s more about Jennifer Walters, her human form, and her “girl problems”. The crux of the story is Jennifer tooling around, talking to her friend, and trying to get a job. She spends way too much time obsessing over boyfriends — past,…
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The Books I Read: May – June 2013
The Boy Who Couldn’t Sleep and Never Had To by D.C. Pierson You might remember this story from the famous “Yahoo! Answers” response to someone who asked for a summary, wanting to skip the summer reading. The D.C. Pierson himself responded, saying how disappointed he was trying to avoid it because it sounded like work, when the book is much better than other classics that could pop up on such a list. (Christ, Charlie Brown got assigned War and Peace, and that was just for Christmas vacation!) But the book is everything Pierson said it was. The thing is it’s really rather… how do I put this… The title promises…
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The Books I Read: March – April 2013
Seven Seasons of Buffy: Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers Discuss Their Favorite Television Show edited by Glenn Yeffeth Like “The Girl Who Was on Fire: Your Favorite Authors on Suzanne Collins’s Hunger Games Trilogy” edited by Leah Wilson et al., a lot of the essays in this book start getting samey. The power of friendship, sexiness of vampires, who should Buffy be with, wiccan good, love the earth, woman power. It starts feeling like refined versions of online editorials, only by professional authors. And that’s saying something because, unlike most things, I did not lurk on Buffy web sites. I didn’t read the analyses or identify with a main character…
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The Books I Read: January – February 2013
Heights of the Depths (The Hidden Earth Chronicles #2) by Peter David This book wasn’t as excellent as the first one, but still pretty good. Maybe because it’s the second of a trilogy, always a disadvantage since it loses the excitement of an introduction or resolution and there’s more moving characters to a destination. Also, the eBook version had quite a few typography problems. The spacing would go from single to double with no transition, and the font size would change sometimes. It looked unprofessionally produced, which doesn’t match what I know of Peter David — a consummate writer-fo’-life. I hope this was just a blip. The book continues where…
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The Books I Read: November – December 2012
Room by Emma Donoghue Oh my god. This might be the best book I ever read. Certainly the best book I read this quarter, and maybe the best all year. From the moment I saw its description, I was too intrigued. Room takes place in just that: a room. The entire novel revolves around a woman locked in this 12×12 space that she never leaves. Just that alone had me hooked — what happened? Was there an apocalypse? Is this a survival story? How do you write an entire book that takes place in one room? Much less a book that keeps getting onto “best of the year” lists. How…
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The Books I Read: September – October 2012
The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle My mom was surprised I’d never read it. And I saw the movie, which I loved for its campy 80’s-ness and animation that wasn’t Disney. The book follows the movie pretty damn well. It’s almost word-for-word. So much that I’m afraid my experience with the movie colored my opinion of the book. I guess it’s like when you hear the remix to a song first, then you hear the original version. But the remix was the first one you heard so you like that better. I’m sure there’s a name for that phenomenon. Anyway, I wish I could say I enjoyed it and…
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The Books I Read: July – August 2012
Ready Player One by Ernest Cline I was really looking forward to this one. I kept hearing all these tales about how it’s made for my generation and persona type, the geek who grew up in the 1980’s. It is not a grand epic book with grand themes. It is meant for a specific audience and never deviates from that. But if you are in that audience, you will love this book. Unfortunately for me, I found out I am juuuuust a bit outside that audience because I was born in 1981, and most of the nostalgia is too early for me. Video games are Atari and arcade cabinets, not…