New Year, Same Reading Challenge
I decided to do one more year reviewing award-nominees.
I will admit that part of the reason that I agreed to do the same challenge again (particularly in my role as SF/F book reviewer for Bitter Empire) is that I'm going to be attending WorldCON this year--and this is going to be another Year of the Puppy and I might like to be able to do some live-tweeting of the award ceremony for BE.
I have a couple of books that I'm reading to finish out last years' awards, but the Philip K. Dick Award nominees are out:
Edge of Dark, Brenda Cooper (Pyr)
After the Saucers Landed, Douglas Lain (Night Shade)
(R)evolution, PJ Manney (47North)
Apex, Ramez Naam (Angry Robot)
Windswept, Adam Rakunas (Angry Robot)
Archangel, Marguerite Reed (Arche)
I just bought Archangel for my Kindle, partly out of favoritism and curiosity. A number of my Facebook friends are friends with Marguerite Reed and so I'm deeply curious what her book is going to be like.
I'm looking forward to doing this again, if only because I have to say this last year exposed me to a lot of books that I otherwise normally would never have sought out. Grasshopper Jungle by Andrew Smith? Yeah, I probably would have looked at that description and thought, "NOPE." (But I ended up really loving it.) And there have been a lot of UK and British awards that exposed me to people I just wasn't terribly familiar with, but, at least in one case, now adore. Frances Hardinge, for instance. She's the author of Cuckoo's Song, which I adored, and The Lie Tree, which I just finished because that one was up for an end-of-the-year award.
Also, it's really good for me to have a structure to have to try to follow. I tend to flounder around when I'm just randomly trying to pick book for myself.
Anyway, I don't have a lot of other news. I'm mostly just surviving the continued threat of Mercury Retrograde. Yesterday, the planet's malevolent influence was mostly felt through some minor-to-midland bickering about school work with Mason. It worked out in the end, but it made the start to the morning more difficult. Today was forgotten gym clothes--which we remembered in time to turn around a fetch, but caused a slight kerfluffle. Shawn's back has also gone out, so that's less that optimal, as they say. So we continue to limp along... stumbling at every turn.
I will admit that part of the reason that I agreed to do the same challenge again (particularly in my role as SF/F book reviewer for Bitter Empire) is that I'm going to be attending WorldCON this year--and this is going to be another Year of the Puppy and I might like to be able to do some live-tweeting of the award ceremony for BE.
I have a couple of books that I'm reading to finish out last years' awards, but the Philip K. Dick Award nominees are out:
Edge of Dark, Brenda Cooper (Pyr)
After the Saucers Landed, Douglas Lain (Night Shade)
(R)evolution, PJ Manney (47North)
Apex, Ramez Naam (Angry Robot)
Windswept, Adam Rakunas (Angry Robot)
Archangel, Marguerite Reed (Arche)
I just bought Archangel for my Kindle, partly out of favoritism and curiosity. A number of my Facebook friends are friends with Marguerite Reed and so I'm deeply curious what her book is going to be like.
I'm looking forward to doing this again, if only because I have to say this last year exposed me to a lot of books that I otherwise normally would never have sought out. Grasshopper Jungle by Andrew Smith? Yeah, I probably would have looked at that description and thought, "NOPE." (But I ended up really loving it.) And there have been a lot of UK and British awards that exposed me to people I just wasn't terribly familiar with, but, at least in one case, now adore. Frances Hardinge, for instance. She's the author of Cuckoo's Song, which I adored, and The Lie Tree, which I just finished because that one was up for an end-of-the-year award.
Also, it's really good for me to have a structure to have to try to follow. I tend to flounder around when I'm just randomly trying to pick book for myself.
Anyway, I don't have a lot of other news. I'm mostly just surviving the continued threat of Mercury Retrograde. Yesterday, the planet's malevolent influence was mostly felt through some minor-to-midland bickering about school work with Mason. It worked out in the end, but it made the start to the morning more difficult. Today was forgotten gym clothes--which we remembered in time to turn around a fetch, but caused a slight kerfluffle. Shawn's back has also gone out, so that's less that optimal, as they say. So we continue to limp along... stumbling at every turn.