#16: Miniatures by John Scalzi. 3.5. Collection of very, very short works, nearly all in that very distinctive Scalzi style. Amusing (although not necessarily particularly memorable).

#17: Hidden Youth: Speculative Fiction from the Margins of History Ed by Mikki Kendall and Chesya Burke. 3. A very mixed bag. Nothing terrible, but many of the ( Read more... )

#1. Penric and the Shaman by Lois McMaster Bujold. 4.5. Charming. Penric's grown up quite a bit from his first novella, and is no longer quite so ridiculously innocent, but his relationship with the demon possessing him remains delightful.

#2. Penric's Mission by Lois McMaster Bujold. 3.5. Still fun, but doesn't come together as well as the ( Read more... )

#96: Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen by Lois McMaster Bujold. 3.5. Let's be clear here - there is no plot in this book. It's basically "Remember Cordelia? Let's hang out with her!" Let's continue to be clear - I didn't particularly mind. This was really more like a little vacation where you got to visit friends and don't do particularly much of ( Read more... )

#84: Mating in Captivity by Esther Perel. 3. The central thesis is that passion and domesticity intersect so badly because you want to feel safe in a long term relationship and that the erotic thrives precisely on not feeling exactly safe. It's not a bad argument, but I didn't find it overall to be all that enlightening.

#85: Glasshouse by Charles ( Read more... )

#76: Un Lun Dun by China Mieville. 3.5. I particularly like this YA novel for subverting a usual trope - the protagonist who saves the day is not the Chosen One. The Chosen One kinda screws up, and her friend ends up taking the lead. Which causes the friend no end of trouble. Similarly, the long intricate quest comes out not at all as typical. It ( Read more... )

#66: The Apocalypse Codex by Charles Stross. 4. Love the Laundry Files in general. The combination of dry bureaucratic humor and terrors from beyond just really works for me. This one's structure is somewhat odd, as he shifts away from first person here and there, not always to great effect. But overall, it works, and I'm enjoying Bob's increasing ( Read more... )

I've very much fallen behind this year. I suspect I'm not making it to 100.

#58 Deadline by Mira Grant. 4. When it became clear at the end of the first novel of this trilogy that the second book was going to be in the voice of a different character, I wasn't really sure I wanted to continue. I liked Georgia; I was not a huge fan of Shaun. ( Read more... )

#31: Her Every Wish by Courtney Milan. 3. Like most Milan, this romance is better than most because it skips the obvious answer (also, because while some of the tension is from misunderstanding, they do actually talk it out before they both look like idiots). But in the longer books, she skips on to the third or fourth answer she thinks of. In this ( Read more... )

#26: Priceless: How I Went Undercover to Rescue the World's Stolen Treasures by Robert K. Wittman and John Shiffman. 3.5. This memoir by the FBI's only full time undercover art crime specialist (retired) has a lot of fun little details but ultimately didn't leave that big an impression on me. It's unfortunate that it actually does play out a lot ( Read more... )

#1: One Eyed Jack by Elizabeth Bear. 3.5. Spies and vampires and the spirits of cities, lost in Las Vegas, in the wreckage left by the Promethean Age books. Fun, although as always I feel like I'm missing half the information she's trying to convey. I only finally figured out the media ghosts when she thanked the fandoms in the afterwards; I hadn't ( Read more... )