I’ve run a tiny bit behind on my bingo hero mode reviews, so this is me ripping the band aid, 7 reviews in one day, what could possibly go wrong. These are possibly not my smartest work .
The Warrior’s Apprentice by Lois McMaster Bujold
What’s it about?
Tyrion Lanister in space if he’d been raised by loving parents. Physical strength’s not his thing, he gets by on wits and the ability to spout convincing bullshit. After he finds himself in debt he ends up way in over his head as the commander of a mercenary fleet. Includes great humor and space battles.
Read for bookclub in June and loved it, I’ve only read 3 books of the Vorkosigan Saga so far but it has quickly made its way into my top 10 favorites of all time. I loved everything about this book, the characters, the action, the pacing, the humor. I laughed out loud for an entire chapter. I appreciate how despite the book’s general tone being cheerful it does not shy away from dark shit, which happens and gets dealt with properly.
Miles is just great, I was expecting to like him because of all the hype, but I’m his biggest fan. The wit, the self deprecating humour, the sheer balls on him, love it all.
Bingo squares:Character with a Disability (hard), Any r/Fantasy Book Club or Read Along, local to Minneapolis, I will personally recommend this to everyone anytime.
Alif the Unseen by G. Willow Wilson
What’s it about?
A hacker in a modern day middle eastern police state gets dumped by his girlfriend and makes a kinda-magical stalker program as a reaction. The government wants this program and the book is chase through the real world and the djinn world trying to make it out alive.
Read for bookclub in July and enjoyed it, but it suffers a bit from having a very intense
second half and a pretty bland first half. I also read it for the cyberpunk square, which was all technobabble for me, but other readers mentioned how the coding part is pretty inaccurately represented. I think it’s meant to be a mix of tech and magic but the magic isn’t clear enough.
The main character is pretty unlikeable, and his redemption is questionable.
It’s also not generally my type of book as it hits close to real world contemporary horribleness, but it goes more into the magical realm in the second half, which might be why I warmed up to it. The world building is interesting, I like the middle eastern setting, and the way the fantastical mixes with the mundane, in a not entirely unfamiliar way, hint hint nudge wink “not-diagon-alley” thing.
My favorite part was probably the chase, which stars near the beginning and just gets crazier and crazier. The allies Alif manages to attract are more interesting than he is, and he doesn’t deserve them.
Bingo squares:Any r/Fantasy Book Club or Read Along,Cyberpunk (hard) , SFF Novel by a Local-to-You Author (born/raised in Morris County, NJ / raised in Boulder, CO / college in Boston, MA / some time in Cairo, Egypt / now Seattle, Washington), #OwnVoices
Robert E. Howard’s Conan the Cimmerian Barbarian: The Complete Weird Tales Omnibus by Robert E. Howard
What’s it about?
A collection of sword and sorcery short stories, novellas and a novel with Conan being strong, fighting things and usually saving the day. Creepy magic and ancient ruins a plenty.
Read for the audiobook hard mode square, and it was hard to get through. Individually the stories are fun, but after around hour 20 of the audiobook they started feeling very samey, and the outdated aspects very grating.
The good
Conan is some sort of confidence porn. The way he walks into any situation and knows he can handle it, the level of chill he’s got and his peace with “if we die we die” is inspiring. Even when he pervs on women, it’s not like the sexually frustrated Dresden desperate for something he can’t get, it’s like James Bond, swimming in pussy, appreciating it like a fine wine. (what could possibly go wrong? I could write this phrase and then somehow decide not to edit it out)
The stories are fun, there’s a lot of action, some vivid battle scenes, the atmosphere is great, if you love creepy jungles or ruins.
The bad
While it’s not necessarily bad bad, it gets samey. Especially the middle-period ones are written to a pulpy formula and it shows. There are some stories that really stand out, but many blend together. I feel like this could be avoided by not going through the whole bunch in one go.
The ugly
It’s probably a product of its time, but there’s some dated racist & sexist shit. It’s always the white strong smart man saving the damsel from the bad savage black people. And the descriptions of people of color are just … like those caricature 30s cartoons with exaggerated features, it was weird, it;s not all stories that focus on that, but some right in the beginning set the tone. There’s also the fact that a lot of the women are merely set dressing, but there are a few stories with actual heroines, a queen and pirate queen most notably.
My favorite stories in the collection: “The Tower of the Elephant.”, “The People of the Black Circle” , “Queen of the Black Coast.” and the novel at the end “The Hour of the Dragon.”
Bingo squares: Graphic Novel/Audiobook (Hard), Title with Four or More Words (Hard), Five Short Stories (Hard), local to Texas, more info here
The Secret Loves of Geek Girls edited by Hope Nicholson
What’s it about?
A non-fiction anthology mixing prose and comics with love stories of geeky authors.
I picked this up on a whim with no knowledge about it and read it all in 2 days while travelling. It is super fun, and so cute and so relatable, if you’re any sort of geek girl. There’s also volume 2 out there that’s not just for girls. I loved how diverse the writers are, covering so many identities and sexual orientations.
Also, I’m a bit sad I never got into fan fiction properly as a teen, looks like it was a fun and informative pass time.
Bingo squares: Might work for substitution the non-fiction fantasy related square from a while back
For We Are Many: Bobiverse, Book 2 Dennis E. Taylor
What’s it about?
In the first book, Bob ends up as the AI controlling a self-replicating space probe that’s meant to find new inhabitable planets for mankind, preferably before they blow themselves out of existence. There are many Bobs but each copy is a bit different which raises a lot of questions about being human and personal identity. By the end of the second book there are too many Bobs to count, but they do sometimes get together in a virtual reality Bobmoot, it’s a lot of fun. Original Bob was a huge nerd and there are tons of geeky references. Book two is mostly about the challenges of colonization and dealing with a new galactic threat.
I loved Bobiverse one, and I loved Bobiverse two, and I fully expect to feel the same way about volume 3. Also this is one of the bestest audiobooks.
They’re fun, so nerdy and they get pretty intense sometimes. They’re a bit short for how many characters and storylines are going on, it feels like some parts could have done with a bit more development, but it didn’t really bother me.
I really enjoyed the new big threat, but it does end with the big threat still looming so it looks like reading book 3 is necessary for a satisfying conclusion.
Bingo squares: AI Character (Hard), Title with Four or More Words, Audiobook, must live somewhere but I couldn’t find where with a quick search, after a certain point it’s stalking
The Cat Who Walked a Thousand Miles by Kij Johnson
This is a super cute short thing (novelette I think) from a cat’s point of view. The cat is called Small Cat, and she ends up alone after a big fire and sets out to find other cats. She crosses all of Japan, meeting all sorts of people that help and hinder her along the way, and a few other cats and dogs. If you’re like me and don’t like animal stories with sad endings, don’t worry it ends super cute. It’s a quick fun read would recommend to all cat lovers. Only wish it were longer.
Bingo squares: short story
Tenebre Cazul Laura by Daniel Timariu
What’s it about?
This is for my localest posible square, it’s a book written by an author from my city, set in my city. It’s pretty Dresdeny, right down to being weird around ladies, I dunno what it is about supernatural detectives that makes them fall for anything in a skirt.
If you can read a book set in your city do it, it’s super fun, especially if the city is accurately portrayed. And even better if there’s a witch’s house on your friend’s street and a monsters’ lair on your other friend’s street and now you wondering what they’re up to in their spare time.
The underworld is really well developed in this series, there are all sorts of creatures, international and local, and the characters have names according to when the creatures settled in the area. So for instance the strigoi, who are very creepy undeady eternal monsters, have Dacian names, that’s pre-roman over here, and the werewolves have Hungarian names. The demons have names like Cristal Dezordine (=mess) and the goblins have english names. There are intricate relationships between all these species and secret government organizations that our MC has to learn to navigate.
This case starts with Laura, one of the living dead, that needs the disappearance of her masters investigated before she turns truly dead. Things get complicated as it turns out everyone has an interest in this disappearance. Wherever MC goes he steps on toes and finds he knows less than everybody else. I was enjoying it and able to follow along till about 85% in when it just got too convoluted for me. I wasn’t a huge fan of the final reveal, but maybe if I’d had paid more attention it would have made more sense.
Bingo squares: local to Romania