wednesday reads n' things
In free ebook news, Witchmark by C. L Polk is the February selection for the Tor eBook Club. (US and Canada only, alas, and (ETA) only through the 16th.)
What I've recently finished reading:
In actual physical (paper!), the ARC of Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir, which I loved. This is like, necromantic Hunger Games in a gothic mansion in SPACE, orchestrated by Agatha Christie, except with more swordplay, more lesbians, and more skeletons. I mean honestly I have no idea what genre this is. And I don't care, I want more.
Gideon is a wise-cracking, sword-toting fighter, orphan of the subterranean world of the Ninth House in a universe/future where cosmology, religion, and technology all seem to be bound up into various aspects of necromancy. She hates the Ninth, and she hates Harrowhark Nonagesimus, Reverend Daughter of the Ninth, talented necromancer and Gideon's childhood nemesis. (Harrow hates her back.) When the heir of each house is invited to a creepy decaying mansion, along with his or her 'cavalier', to compete in uncovering the secrets of Necromancy The Next Level, Gideon and Harrow have to learn to work together and respect each other, and it's way more fun than that makes it sound.
The style is breezy and irreverent and Gideon's speech patterns are entirely 21st-century-young-adult, but somehow that works. There is probably worldbuilding going on somewhere, though it's mostly just handwaving, but...somehow that works. I don't know. Part of me is skeptical about people fighting with swords when they have spaceships, and how come if they can (sometimes) talk to ghosts they can't just ask the poor guy who just got killed who did this to you? But the part of me that went OOH SHINY BAD-ASS WOMAN WHO MAKES NO BONES ABOUT BEING ATTRACTED TO OTHER WOMAN HAHA SHE SAID BONES told that part to shut up.
Here is a little bit, to give you the feel:
"Hood up," breathed Harrowhawk, "hide that ridiculous hair."
"Your dead mummified mother's got ridiculous hair."
"Griddle, we're within the planet's halo now, and I will delight in violence."
A final, thuddering clunk. Complete stillness. The seals on the outside were unlatched by some outside force, and as light blazed around the edges of the hatch, Gideon winked at her increasingly agitated companion. She said, sotto voce: "But then you couldn't have admired...these," and whipped on the glasses she'd unearthed back home. They were ancient smoked-glass sunglasses, with thin black frames and big mirrored lenses, and they greyed out Harrow's expression of incredulous horror as she adjusted them on her nose. That was the last thing she saw before the light got in.
In audio, I finished listening to Blackfish City by Sam J. Miller, which is dystopian cli-fi set on a "grid city" in the north Atlantic, crowded with the mostly-desperate survivors of a post-sea-level-rise world, run by software managed by a shadowy elite of wealthy shareholders. The first third of the book is slow and not particularly compelling, with rather more infodump than one would like (though it's presented in a really cool way) and fairly unsympathetic viewpoint characters, but once the separate threads of narrative begin to weave together (and the characters acquire greater depth) it becomes very interesting indeed. I was particularly impressed by the careful assembly, in the later chapters, of all the information given early in the book; not a gun on the wall remains unfired.
The worldbuilding is intricate and inventive. Of the four viewpoint characters, one's gay and one is nonbinary, and there is a significant established f/f relationship. The strongest theme running throughout the book is that of the importance of family; you might have friends and business associates, but blood bonds are the closest bonds.
What I'm reading next:
Educated, by Tara Westover. In case you haven't heard the buzz, this is a memoir by a woman who grew up in Idaho with a family of survivalists, preparing for the end of the world by living very off-grid, never seeing a doctor (all home remedies) and being (inadequately) homeschooled. When she realized she wanted more, she taught herself enough math and grammar to be able to go to Brigham Young University, where she studied history, and eventually got a PhD in history at Cambridge.
What I'm watching now:
Still Star Trek: Discovery. We're through episode 6 of S1.
What I'm playing now:
Games night last night! First we played One Night Werewolf, which - I'm not a fan of bluffing games, but I have to say this went quickly and struck me as a good party game. Then we played Forbidden Desert, which I really enjoyed! I've never played a cooperative game before (in which all the players are a 'team' against the game itself) but I thought the mechanism of the game was very clever and worked super well. The idea is that you have crash-landed your steampunk plane in a desert and need to find the four key pieces and bring them to the launch pad to escape before anyone dies of thirst or being buried by the sandstorm. Our group won against the game, yay! (Here is a good review of the gameplay.)
Also still playing Pillars of Eternity. Just met the Devil of Caroc - I think I'm in love.
Crossposted from isis at Dreamwidth where there are
comments. | Comment at Dreamwidth
What I've recently finished reading:
In actual physical (paper!), the ARC of Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir, which I loved. This is like, necromantic Hunger Games in a gothic mansion in SPACE, orchestrated by Agatha Christie, except with more swordplay, more lesbians, and more skeletons. I mean honestly I have no idea what genre this is. And I don't care, I want more.
Gideon is a wise-cracking, sword-toting fighter, orphan of the subterranean world of the Ninth House in a universe/future where cosmology, religion, and technology all seem to be bound up into various aspects of necromancy. She hates the Ninth, and she hates Harrowhark Nonagesimus, Reverend Daughter of the Ninth, talented necromancer and Gideon's childhood nemesis. (Harrow hates her back.) When the heir of each house is invited to a creepy decaying mansion, along with his or her 'cavalier', to compete in uncovering the secrets of Necromancy The Next Level, Gideon and Harrow have to learn to work together and respect each other, and it's way more fun than that makes it sound.
The style is breezy and irreverent and Gideon's speech patterns are entirely 21st-century-young-adult, but somehow that works. There is probably worldbuilding going on somewhere, though it's mostly just handwaving, but...somehow that works. I don't know. Part of me is skeptical about people fighting with swords when they have spaceships, and how come if they can (sometimes) talk to ghosts they can't just ask the poor guy who just got killed who did this to you? But the part of me that went OOH SHINY BAD-ASS WOMAN WHO MAKES NO BONES ABOUT BEING ATTRACTED TO OTHER WOMAN HAHA SHE SAID BONES told that part to shut up.
Here is a little bit, to give you the feel:
"Hood up," breathed Harrowhawk, "hide that ridiculous hair."
"Your dead mummified mother's got ridiculous hair."
"Griddle, we're within the planet's halo now, and I will delight in violence."
A final, thuddering clunk. Complete stillness. The seals on the outside were unlatched by some outside force, and as light blazed around the edges of the hatch, Gideon winked at her increasingly agitated companion. She said, sotto voce: "But then you couldn't have admired...these," and whipped on the glasses she'd unearthed back home. They were ancient smoked-glass sunglasses, with thin black frames and big mirrored lenses, and they greyed out Harrow's expression of incredulous horror as she adjusted them on her nose. That was the last thing she saw before the light got in.
In audio, I finished listening to Blackfish City by Sam J. Miller, which is dystopian cli-fi set on a "grid city" in the north Atlantic, crowded with the mostly-desperate survivors of a post-sea-level-rise world, run by software managed by a shadowy elite of wealthy shareholders. The first third of the book is slow and not particularly compelling, with rather more infodump than one would like (though it's presented in a really cool way) and fairly unsympathetic viewpoint characters, but once the separate threads of narrative begin to weave together (and the characters acquire greater depth) it becomes very interesting indeed. I was particularly impressed by the careful assembly, in the later chapters, of all the information given early in the book; not a gun on the wall remains unfired.
The worldbuilding is intricate and inventive. Of the four viewpoint characters, one's gay and one is nonbinary, and there is a significant established f/f relationship. The strongest theme running throughout the book is that of the importance of family; you might have friends and business associates, but blood bonds are the closest bonds.
What I'm reading next:
Educated, by Tara Westover. In case you haven't heard the buzz, this is a memoir by a woman who grew up in Idaho with a family of survivalists, preparing for the end of the world by living very off-grid, never seeing a doctor (all home remedies) and being (inadequately) homeschooled. When she realized she wanted more, she taught herself enough math and grammar to be able to go to Brigham Young University, where she studied history, and eventually got a PhD in history at Cambridge.
What I'm watching now:
Still Star Trek: Discovery. We're through episode 6 of S1.
What I'm playing now:
Games night last night! First we played One Night Werewolf, which - I'm not a fan of bluffing games, but I have to say this went quickly and struck me as a good party game. Then we played Forbidden Desert, which I really enjoyed! I've never played a cooperative game before (in which all the players are a 'team' against the game itself) but I thought the mechanism of the game was very clever and worked super well. The idea is that you have crash-landed your steampunk plane in a desert and need to find the four key pieces and bring them to the launch pad to escape before anyone dies of thirst or being buried by the sandstorm. Our group won against the game, yay! (Here is a good review of the gameplay.)
Also still playing Pillars of Eternity. Just met the Devil of Caroc - I think I'm in love.
Crossposted from isis at Dreamwidth where there are
comments. | Comment at Dreamwidth