6/19/2010
- megan: destroyer. c j cherryh.
- verdict: +
- review:
she's into these. but i missed most of the review. that's what happens
when you flaunt the rules of order. just saying.
- megan: empress & the riven kingdom. karen miller.
- verdict: ++
- review:
she's into these books for sure. miller is a good writer and the books
are super absorbing. kind of a conan world with lots of loincloths and
magic and crystals and stuff. i dunno, this was a whirlwind review and
i couldn't really follow it.
- chris: the knife of never letting go. patrick ness.
- verdict: +
- review:
"yeah, it had a ridiculous title. it's a young adult book." this has
something to do with mind reading and a chase scene. he really likes
it, great book. he doesn't want to say much for fear of ruining
it. (he gets a call "from his stylist," which he has to take.) anyway
everything the dude knows about the world turns out to be LIES LIES
LIES. definitely a young adult book, but good. recommended.
- chris: the gone-away world. nick harkaway.
- verdict: ++
- review:
"reads like a surrealist smashup of pynchon and pratchett, vonnegut
and heller." ok if that's not bullshit from top to bottom, i don't
know what is. but chris says "that's a pretty good summary, but it's
like he specifically set out to write a book like that." this is the
son of john le carre, evidently. high larious. "this was in the
literature section." well, duh. anyway, it seems that "if you're john
le carre's son, you have a good agent, and you're on vintage. if
you're brian patrick slattery, you're on tor." too bad, but that's the
world, i guess. anyway, chris really liked it. i shan't type in the
summary, shall i. pretty obviously his first book, it's awkward in
spots, but is good.
- paul: light. m john harrison.
- verdict: +
- review:
"i mostly backed off on my hate for light, but i read it a couple
months ago, and mostly forgot it." generally, he felt a bit cheated by
the ending, and didn't like the strict alternation between the three
viewpoints, but other than that, he liked it.
- adam: the name of the wind. patrick rothfuss.
- verdict: +++
- review:
"this is maybe my favorite fantasy book i've read in a decade." strong
praise from a huge fan of the very finest pulp. we've had many reviews
of this already, so i won't say more. this is a winner, though, by any
standards.
- jen and brandon: the city and the city. china mieville.
- verdict: +++
- review:
we've been over this a couple of times, too. suffice to say opinion
continues to be unanimous. highly recommended.
- chad: kraken. china mieville.
- verdict: ++
- review:
written before the city and the city, but only released now. similar
in many ways to the city and the city, taking place in "basically the
real world" in modern-day london. in terms of plot, pacing and
structure, this is a much bigger book. it's been compared to
neverwhere, in that it has some similarities but is much, much
better. the book begins when someone has stolen the giant squid, and
the hero is, i guess, the curator. thus begins a wild, mystery fantasy
romp. basically the curator hooks up with torchwood and finds that
there may be a squid cult involved. it quickly turns into a crazy
fantasy world with tons of magic. he liked it a lot, the only drawback
is that it maybe just gets too big. tons of plot lines, tons of
characters, blah blah. but really well done.
- group discussion: house of suns. alastair reynolds.
no simple verdict for this one, maybe we can reach some sort of
consensus, we'll see... ok, i can't type all of this in. we didn't
like it. jeff, the "biggest reynolds fan," wishes to offer a
perspective. but he can hardly get a word in. i would like to write
down all the things that we didn't like about this book, because man,
oh man, there are some good ones. anyway, sometimes you really want to
read a space opera, but i would really like to live in a world where
you could do better than this.
- that's all, folks.