Wednesday, September 30, 2020

Spoilery Discussion: A Killing Frost and Seanan Mcguire's October Daye Series





This post is for a spoilery discussion of the 14th novel in Seanan McGuire's October Daye series.  If you are interested in the series and want to speculate on what the events of this book mean?  This is for you.  If not, and you still want to read this series, I recommend not reading on beyond the jump.


If you accidentally found this page and want to read the actual spoiler free review of this book, go here.


You have been warned.


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SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: A Killing Frost by Seanan McGuire



A Killing Frost is the Fourteenth (14th!) novel in Seanan McGuire's "October Daye" series - her fae/urban fantasy series.  The October Daye series is one of the very few long running series I read - one of the other's is McGuire's other long-runner, InCryptid - and it's a series that I have spent way too much time thinking about - containing a ton of excellent characters, a well built long term story arc that still somehow manages to pull off surprises here and there, and yet always manages to contain satisfying individual stories within each single volume.  I binge read the first 10 novels when they were in the Hugo Packet for Best Series, and have since picked up each new volume as it came out, and this was really no different (I read this from midnight to 4AM on release night).

And A Killing Frost is a hell of an installment in terms of moving long term plot arcs forward, and a very solid installment in its own right, with the potential to lead into a major series-altering fifteen book (I could be totally wrong on that mind you).  It's not perfect and isn't quite one of my favorites - the book relies too much on a last act twist that I don't really feel is set up at all (although my mind could be changed by later developments) that feels like a deus ex machina - but it's definitely up there with some of the best books in the series.  Now I have to struggle to wait for book 15, sigh.

Note1:  This review will also touch upon Shine in Pearl, a novella featuring three of the characters in this novel that is included.

Note2: This will be as spoiler-free a review as possible (obviously events from prior books will be referenced).  I will post a spoilery thoughts post for this book as well, so if you're interested in my spoiler-filled thoughts, wait for that, and if you want to post in comments, do so at THAT post, which can be found HERE.


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Tuesday, September 29, 2020

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Incendiary by Zoraida Córdova


Incendiary is the first in a new Young Adult Fantasy trilogy by author Zoraida Córdova, with the setting inspired by Inquisitorial Spain.  Córdova is a prolific YA writer whose work I hadn't gotten to previously, but one I was hoping to get to at some point, so I requested this novel via inter-library loan once my library reopened.

And well, Incendiary is a really interesting YA fantasy novel, with a compelling protagonist....but also one that feels not quite sure what it wants to do with her.  The idea behind the protagonist is strong, a young woman from a magical people who are hunted by the king as lesser for their culture who is ostracized even further for her ability to take people's memories, and because of her childhood using that power to help the king hurt her people.  The result is a heroine who is wracked with guilt and trauma as she desperately tries to atone and do good, but the book's plot has a number of predictable plot twists and ends at a place where I just wanted more - and not because i was satisfied with what had taken place.  I'm intrigued enough to continue on with this trilogy, but I'm hoping that the 2nd installment will contain a more satisfying package to reward me (even when it almost certainly ends in a cliffhanger).


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Friday, September 25, 2020

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Night of the Dragon by Julie Kagawa


Night of the Dragon is the final book in Julie Kagawa's Japanese Myth-inspired YA Fantasy trilogy, Shadow of the Fox.  The series began with Shadow of the Fox (Reviewed Here) and continued with the second novel, Soul of the Sword (Reviewed Here).  I enjoyed the first novel as an audiobook and got an advance copy of the second book through Netgalley, so I'd always hoped to see how the trilogy would conclude.  And while I missed the initial release of this one, I managed to get a copy recently via inter-library loan, so finally I could finish it all up

And well, Night of the Dragon is a really strong and enjoyable conclusion, which I liked a lot and really felt rewarded me for sticking with this series.  It concludes the trilogy with a very satisfying ending and features a plot that combines the great sometimes dark character work from the 2nd novel with the encounters with many beings out of Japanese myth from the first novel.  The result nails most of what I had really enjoyed in this series, and makes this a trilogy well worth recommending for Middle Grade to YA readers looking for something Japanese inspired.

Spoilers for the first two books are inevitable.


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Thursday, September 24, 2020

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Vicious Spirits by Kat Cho

Vicious Spirits is the second part of a YA Fantasy duology by Kat Cho, with the first half being her 2019 novel Wicked Fox  (which I reviewed here).  It's not just a YA fantasy series, but a pair of books that basically feel like the idea of a teenage kdrama, only with Korean fantasy creatures existing in secret alongside the human teens in Seoul.  Wicked Fox dealt with a romantic coupling of Jihoon, a human teen living with his grandmother, and Miyoung a teenage Gumiho girl who would rather not drain human spirits as she needs in order to survive.  It was a twisty tale, with some pretty ridiculous but strong plot twists along the way, and it featured a few interesting side characters...whom the book wasn't quite able to feature as much as I wanted.

Vicious Spirits shifts the focus really to those side characters, particularly Jihoon's best friend Lee Somin and the Dobbaeki Junu.  The story still deals in good part with our original duo, but this is mostly a romance story between the two, with all the twists you'd expect and more - Junu's supernatural origins being a particular barrier.  It's very well done, if very predictable at times (far more than the first book), and it's far from subtle but hey, that's the style you should be expecting here.  And again, it's very fun and enjoyable as a result, so yeah still very much recommended.


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Wednesday, September 23, 2020

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Daughters of Nri by Reni K Amayo


Daughters of Nri is the first novel in a fantasy series by Nigerian-British author Reni K Amayo (also her debut novel).  It's a fantasy novel that takes place in a fantasy version of Africa, specifically a fantasy version of the Kingdom of Nri, with its setting heavily inspired by Igbo Mythology.  It's the first in a series, and this book is available on Kindle Unlimited, so I was very willing to give it a shot when someone brought it up on twitter.

And well, like a lot of works these days, Daughters of Nri has a really strong setup of its setting and some very interesting characters....but feels more like a prologue than the meat of an actual story.  I really liked the world created here - a world in which the gods have seemingly been slain for good reason - according to the man in power who did it of course - and a pair of twins separated at birth grow up and realize in very different ways that things need to change.  But events that the reader will be expecting for the entire book don't occur until the very end, and I mean the very end, which leaves the package feeling a bit unsatisfying.  Still, as a prologue, it's one that certainly kept me interested, and so I will try to be back for the sequel when it comes out.


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Tuesday, September 22, 2020

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Beyond Pain by Kit Rocha


Beyond Pain is the third novel in Kit Rocha's "Beyond" series, their 9 book (and several novella) long series of post-apocalyptic erotic romance novels.  Each book in the series has dealt with a new romantic grouping, with occasional check ins on other characters, and this book is no different from the others in that regard (shifting to masochist O'Kane lieutenant Bren and Six, the woman from Sector 3 who had previously been abused by that sector's late leader).  The first two books seemed to escalate in terms of the sex scenes and in terms of telling the overall series story as they went on, so I was curious if Rocha would be able to continue doing that here, especially as our focus shifted away from the leaders of the cast.

And Beyond Pain doesn't escalate the sexual content - it simply shifts it to a new form, as Six and Bren are very different in their backgrounds, interests, and needs from our prior protagonists.  Even more than any of our prior couples, both Bren and Six have had some serious trauma in their pasts that utterly messed them each up, and the book really explores well how that affects their abilities to trust - both each other and themselves in both sexual and non sexual contents.  Oh and there's still some really damn hot sex scenes littered throughout this book, I don't think the series will ever change there.  The ending does follow a bit of a repetitive pattern for the series, but otherwise, yeah this is another great addition to the series that make me want to continue with it at some point.


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SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Beyond Control by Kit Rocha



Beyond Control is the 2nd book in the post-apoc erotic romance "Beyond" series by author Kit Rocha (a psuedonym for authors Donna Herren and Bree Bridges).  As I noted in my review of book 1 (see here), the series is really only SF in terms of the very edges of the background, with the book being really focused upon the erotic romance between its characters - with lots and lots of sex in the book's pages.  The first book in this series was free at all ebook retailers, and while this book isn't free, it's available as part of a $1.99 package of the first three ebooks (the free book 1, this book, and book 3), which was too cheap of a package for me not to dive in when I needed something less serious to read.

And Beyond Control is very very good, with it switching our focus to Dallas and Lex, the leader of Sector 4 and the Woman at his side who refuses to fully be under his control.  Both Dallas and Lex were major characters in the first book, with Lex being a hell of a character, and that only continues here as she and Dallas deal with their mutual and very sexy attraction as well their individual needs for control.  It is once again incredibly sexy - hilariously whereas the last book featured a prominent four person sex scene, this book expands it to six! - and if you like this sort of thing, is very worth your time.

Note:  If you couldn't tell from the description as an erotic romance series, this book is entirely graphic and quite pornographic, so if somehow you just want romance with a little bit of sex, this won't be for you.


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Monday, September 21, 2020

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Legendborn by Tracy Deonn


Legendborn is a recently released YA fantasy novel from debut author Tracy Deonn.  I reserved it after seeing some praise from authors I trust on twitter, and its description intrigued: a story featuring a black teen attempting to infiltrate a secret society on a college campus (UNC) with roots in the King Arthur Mythos.  The combination brought to mind a combination of two prior books I'd really enjoyed, Leigh Bardugo's "Ninth House" and "Once & Future" by Amy Rose Capetta & Cori McCarthy.  So I was excited to see how it would compare.

And honestly, Legendborn was far better than I thought, and is the second straight YA novel I've felt might be my favorite YA novel of the year.  It takes a combination of influences & themes - racial history of the world and impacts of colonization/imperialism, stress and grief upon the death of a loved one, happenings on a college campus, and well of course the King Arthur mythos - and weaves them together into a fascinating story.  The main character is tremendous as is nearly everything else, and when I finished it I was only disappointed because the sequel isn't already there in my own hands.  So yeah, this one is a big winner and highly recommended.


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Thursday, September 17, 2020

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Star Wars: Shadow Fall by Alexander Freed


Shadow Fall is the second book in Alexander Freed's "Alphabet Squadron" trilogy, following the first book - conveniently named Alphabet Squadron - which I reviewed here.  Alphabet Squadron was seemingly planned as a big deal multimedia project, with the novels meant to tie in with a comic book from the other side, but the comic book petered out after five issues (which were merely okay), so now it appears to be only another trilogy of novels set in the Star Wars universe.  Which isn't necessarily a bad thing, because Alphabet Squadron was one of the most interesting Star Wars novels I've ever read, a dark cynical novel questioning what it means for Imperials to defect and fight for the New Republic after all they've done and how different the two sides really are on the ground level.  And it was really good at asking and dealing with those questions, making me really want to see where the story would go from there.

And Shadow Fall remains fascinating to read, in a way that still makes me so surprised that Disney was willing to publish this trilogy (in a good way).  The book doesn't lighten up its dark cynical take on Star Wars at all, and its lead characters - the four members of the squadron and a major antagonist character - remain fascinating in how they react to the dismal situations they find themselves in, in a galaxy on the edge of change....and yet not.  This is again really not the same type of book as the old X-Wing novels, being a far darker grittier piece of SciFi, but it's really damn good and I still highly recommend it.

NOTE:  Spoilers for book 1 are inevitable, but they don't really matter too much for your enjoyment of book 1.  That said, you may want to skim/reread book 1, or if you've read book 1 brush up on the characters again in Wikipedia, as this book doesn't recap exactly who everyone is in any way before it jumps in.


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Wednesday, September 16, 2020

SciFi Novella Review: Sweet Harmony by Claire North



Full Disclosure:  This book was read as an e-ARC (Advance Reader Copy) obtained via Netgalley from the publisher in advance of the novella's release on September 22, 2020 in exchange for a potential review.  I give my word that this did not affect my review in any way - if I felt conflicted in any way, I would simply have declined to review the novella.


Sweet Harmony by Claire North:  

Sweet Harmony is a new SF (and arguably horror) novella by SF/F author Claire North, who has in the past written a bunch of interesting concept SF/F stories.  I'd read one of her works before, The Sudden Appearance of Hope, and was not as high on it as others - it had one really interesting idea that it explored well, but muddled it all in the end by trying to mesh it with some other less explored ideas.  Sweet Harmony is similarly a concept themed story and since I was given an advance copy by the publisher, I figured I'd try it out.  

And well, Sweet Harmony is fine - it explores an interesting idea: a future where people can use nanobots to alter their body's appearance and features - not just the obvious physical ones, but altering ones libido, making it so you never stop smiling (for women of course), making it so you don't need to brush your teeth, etc. - but the companies that offer those nanobots require monthly payments and god help you if you go into debt.  It then takes this idea and grafts it to the very real expectations society places upon women, and that men place upon women, to oft horrifying effect.  It's a melding of ideas that will become quite predictable early on in this novella to any reader, but North does take the plot in some different horrifying directions by the end - but well...even then it felt almost like there wasn't enough in the concept for a full novella.  

More after the Jump:

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Tuesday, September 15, 2020

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: The Ikessar Falcon by K.S. Villoso




Full Disclosure:  This book was read as an e-ARC (Advance Reader Copy) obtained via Netgalley from the publisher in advance of the book's release on September 22, 2020 in exchange for a potential review.  I give my word that this did not affect my review in any way - if I felt conflicted in any way, I would simply have declined to review the book.

The Ikessar Falcon is the second book in K.S. Villoso's Filipino-inspired Epic Fantasy series, "Chronicles of the Bitch Queen" (My review of the first book, The Wolf of Oren-Yaro is up at the blog here).  I really liked the first book in this series, with its fascinating heroine, torn between what others - including her dead father - expect of her and her duties and lost in a part of the world she is unfamiliar with, and was really excited to see what was going to happen next.  As I noted in my prior review, I believe this series was first self-published, but Orbit picked it up for republishing, and it was through Orbit that I managed to snag an early copy to review.  

And well, The Ikessar Falcon is a damn hard book to review.  On one hand, our protagonist, Talyien, remains fascinating in how she's developed from book 1, and the world expands in many many ways as she and her few allies return home from the city of the first book, dealing with threats new and old.  On the other hand, I'd hoped that she would be able to make a "breakthrough" and take a stand for the idea of her having her own personal wants in this book, which uhhhh doesn't really happen, letting a real asshole of a character mostly off the hook.  This is very much a story in transition here, and it's a LONG one, the longest book I've read all year, which only makes it all a bit more frustrating.

NOTE:  This book comes with a few page long "The Story So Far" summary of book 1, to make it easier to jump right in without having to reread the first novel.  I cannot tell you how much I appreciated that.  

More specifics after the jump (minor spoilers for book 1 follow):

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Monday, September 14, 2020

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: The Doors of Eden by Adrian Tchaikovsky


Full Disclosure:  This book was read as an e-ARC (Advance Reader Copy) obtained via Netgalley from the publisher in advance of the book's release on September 22, 2020 in exchange for a potential review.  I give my word that this did not affect my review in any way - if I felt conflicted in any way, I would simply have declined to review the book.

The Doors of Eden is the latest book from British SF/F author Adrian Tchaikovsky.  I've read one novel and one novella by Tchaikovsky and had mixed feelings.  The novel, the much acclaimed "Children of Time" (Reviewed Here), was a fascinating idea-based SF novel featuring the evolution of an alien species (Spiders!) over generations, but well it didn't have any characters that I particularly enjoyed, limiting my excitement about it (I'm more into character-focused stories).  The novella, his "Firewalkers" (Review Here), had much more interesting characters while still exploring interesting ideas about artificial intelligence, class, and more in a post-apocalyptic world.  So when I was given the chance to read his latest novel (out already in the UK) in advance, I was a little bit hesitant.

And The Doors of Eden kind of justifies my hesitancy.  Like both of the aforementioned works, it has strong interesting ideas - dealing with evolution, parallel Earths, and different ways of existence here - and it even has a few characters whom I really liked.  And then it has certain character relationships and behaviors that just seem treated kind of poorly - particularly in the transphobic actions of its villain - which kind of mar the whole thing.  The result is an uneven book with enough moments to keep me interested throughout, but repeatedly had me facepalming at times at how some things played out, which prevents me from recommending it wholeheartedly.

Trigger Warning:  The antagonist deliberately deadnames (and worse) a trans character, seemingly just to show how evil and transphobic he is.  It's....not done well.  More on this after the jump, but if that's a problem, this book is not going to be for you.

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Friday, September 11, 2020

Fantasy/Horror Novella Review: Yellow Jessamine by Caitlin Starling





Yellow Jessamine by Caitlin Starling:

Yellow Jessamine is a new horror novella by author Caitlin Starling, who I was previously familiar with from her excellent SF/Horror novel "The Luminous Dead".  Like that novel, this is very much a queer horror novel with much of the horror coming from an atmospheric horror, as it's not quite clear how much that's happening is real.

But whereas The Luminous Dead was quite clearly in the genre of SF horror, Yellow Jessamine is more in the form of not just fantasy, but honestly is just outright weird (I don't think of it as part of the "Weird" SF/F genre but I don't know a better word to describe it).  The story spends its entire runtime in the head of its protagonist, who the horror spends its entire time taking apart mentally....and I'm honestly not quite sure if it works?  I think it does, and it's at the very least quite interesting, but well....more after the jump:

Note: I listed to this in audiobook format, and I'm honestly ambivalent about whether I'd recommend that format or not - the reader is very slow and deliberate and at times, given the slow pace of the story, that felt kind of annoying, but by the end, it really added to the atmospheric horror of it all.  I'd probably not recommend it but it's a tough call.

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Thursday, September 10, 2020

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Raybearer by Jordan Ifueko




Raybearer is the debut novel from Nigerian-American author Jordan Ifueko.  It's a young adult novel featuring a world seemingly inspired by a non-Western mythology/setting (neither the marketing nor the acknowledgements seem to suggest a specific culture being the inspiration, so I won't try to extrapolate any further) and it was a novel that I saw a bunch of authors I like hyping up recently when it just came out.  And as it was available immediately as part of the Hoopla Library, I picked it up and read it fairly quickly (it's not a long novel). 

And Raybearer is a fairly solid fantasy debut; the first in a series (trilogy?) but one that ends with a decently satisfying ending.  The main character is really damn good, as a young girl who grows up desperate to both please her mother and to avoid the destiny that mother has enforced upon her, who has a good heart in a world filled with pleasant injustice.  There's also a lot of depth to this world, not all of which gets explored in this novel, to go along with a very solid mix of characters, so I am definitely interested in seeing where things go from here. 


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SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: The Tyrant Baru Cormorant by Seth J Dickinson


The Tyrant Baru Cormorant is the third book in Seth J Dickinson's "The Masquerade" series, after his brilliant "The Traitor Baru Cormorant" in 2015 and 2018's "The Monster Baru Cormorant" (which I reviewed here).  That said, Tyrant isn't really the third book - it's more like the 2nd half of the second book, with it and Monster forming one complete sequel to the original novel Traitor, which makes sense since the two were apparently one original novel split into two (moving the series from three planned novels to four). 

 Traitor is one of the few books to which I've ever given a perfect score and is still an all time favorite, telling a fascinating tale of a girl deciding to rise up and destroy the Evil Empire from within, going along with its methods to gain the power to do so, no matter how repressive of others and of herself those methods must be, with an absolutely devastating ending.  Its follow up, Monster, was a fascinating half of a story with some really interesting themes and really fun moments amidst the darkness, but was kind of a mess as Dickinson split the narrative into several additional points of view as everything in this world expanded in often contradictory ways.  And now we finally have the conclusion to that first half of a novel, in the form of a book that's an absolute doorstopper in length.

And well, Tyrant is a mixed bag, with its structure still a bit of a mess, as it attempts to wrangle multiple factions and a cast of dozens into a cohesive story for our protagonist - the unmistakable Baru Cormorant - to deal with as she struggles with both her goal and the costs she has incurred to try and get to the point where she can destroy the Empire from within.  The writing still contains a huge number of fantastic and often humorous moments (despite the generally dark tone) to carry this book, and the perspectives of different characters actually seem to work better here than in Monster.  But the book's most compelling ideas kind of get muddled in the process, including the primary conflict at the heart of Monster, which is a little disappointing. 

More after the jump - Spoilers for Traitor are inevitable, and some minor spoilers for Monster as well. 


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Wednesday, September 9, 2020

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Beyond Shame by Kit Rocha


Beyond Shame is the first in a self published series of erotic fiction novels by author "Kit Rocha" ( a psuedonym for authors Donna Herren and Bree Bridges), set in a dystopian post-apocalyptic world.  The series came to my attention after Rocha published under a mainstream press the first in a sexy romantic science fiction series, Deal with the Devil (Reviewed Here), which I enjoyed a lot - the perfect blend of fun dialogue and characters and steamy sex scenes, to go along with a fun SF plot.  And with the first book in this series available free from online ebook retailers, I couldn't help myself in giving it a try, figuring hey, I enjoyed the sex scenes in that book, how about a book in which they're the primary focus, and the SF the background?

And uh, yep, Sex is definitely the primary focus of this novel, with the science fiction aspects limited entirely to the deep background.  Fortunately, the sex scenes in this novel, making up something like 80% of the novel in its entirety, are ridiculously fun.  The lead characters - a young woman from a sheltered rich city where sex is heavily restricted who wants far far more and a lieutenant to the top gang in an area outside the city who is far far more accustomed to the many pleasures of sex - are really well done, as are the secondary characters as the more experienced lead guides the other through the pleasures of the flesh.  I will probably be back for more of this series, because well....sometimes this is what you want, and damn is it good.

Note:  If you couldn't tell from the description as an erotic romance series, this book is entirely graphic and quite pornographic, so if somehow you just want romance with a little bit of sex, this won't be for you.


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Tuesday, September 8, 2020

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: The Silvered Serpents by Roshani Chokshi



Full Disclosure:  This book was read as an e-ARC (Advance Reader Copy) obtained via Netgalley from the publisher in advance of the book's release on September 22 2020 in exchange for a potential review.  I give my word that this did not affect my review in any way - if I felt conflicted in any way, I would simply have declined to review the book.


The Silvered Serpents is the sequel to last year's "The Gilded Wolves" (Reviewed Here).  The Gilded Wolves was a novel a lot of people I trust seemed to love - a heist novel featuring an alternate early 20th Century Paris/France, featuring a with a secret Order of Magic behind the scenes, and a crew of outsiders (due to race, class, and other reasons) aiming to pull off a series of heists regarding hidden and lost magics for both fortune and recognition of their own worth.  Unfortunately, I just couldn't find myself to love the novel as much as others, especially as its magic system and one major character were so close in nature to that of another novel I loved (Robert Jackson Bennett's Foundryside) that it was distracting.  Still, there was enough here between the characters, and the very strong setting (which dealt with themes of race and colonialism) to make me want to see where the series would go from the end of the first novel, and I applied for an e-ARC of this sequel as soon as I saw it on NetGalley.

Unfortunately, I honestly found The Silvered Serpents to be an inferior novel to its predecessor, to the point where I actually had a bad taste in my mouth by the ending.  The book takes its predecessor's biggest fault - its least interesting character being its primary protagonist, who was honestly a little annoying in his motivations and actions - and makes it far worse, turning that character into an utterly unlikable person in response to the prior book's happenings.  The rest of the cast has some highlights, but otherwise this novel turns into a heist novel in which the characters just aren't fun or interesting to read, the themes of the setting aren't really explored too heavily, and certain plot elements are both predictable and lead to a cliffhanger ending that is utterly unsatisfying.  There are some highlights where I can see how I might've loved this book otherwise, but they're the exception not the rule.

NOTE:  A Major Spoiler as to The Gilded Wolves' ending is unavoidable in further discussion, so it will not be hidden in the rest of this review.  You are forewarned.


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Monday, September 7, 2020

Book Review: The Disaster Tourist by Yun Ko-Eun (trans. by Lizzie Buehler)


The Disaster Tourist is a short novel by Korean author Yun Ko-Eun, translated from the original Korean text by Lizzie Buehler.   The review which brought the novel to my attention considered it to be SF/F, but I'm really not sure that designation fits, nor is it advertised as such online, so I won't use the designation here.  What it is however is definitely literally fiction that is very much a satire on the real world, and its treatment of many people in different ways.  Like I noted above, this is a "Short Novel", that probably could've been called a novella, but it packs a lot into its page time, and is well worth your time as a result.


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Thursday, September 3, 2020

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Shadowshaper Legacy by Daniel José Older



Shadowshaper Legacy is the third and final book in Daniel José Older's YA Shadowshaper Cypher trilogy, which began with Shadowshaper (Reviewed Here) and continued in Shadowhouse Fall (Reviewed Here) with a pair of novellas in the middle of it all.  It's been a really strong YA series, using a modern family setting of New York City - largely Brooklyn - to deal with issues facing people of color in the real world - like cultural appropriation/gentrification (book 1) and police brutality (book 2).  Each of the first two books had some pacing issues and were probably too short, but the characters were great and the themes were dealt with really well.  Book 2 ended with a major cliffhanger for a number of the characters, so I was really curious to see how the trilogy would be resolved.

And well....Shadowshaper Legacy is an okay ending to the trilogy, with the series' narrative expanding to show perspectives from several of the major side characters, and it all coming to a conclusion that is mostly satisfying.  On the other hand, the plot deals far more heavily with the magic side than the mundane side, which is what had previously allowed it to deal with the serious themes so well, and its exploration of its themes kind of suffers.  And the pacing issues again haunt this book, which is just way too short for all that happens.  But again, the characters remain great and the story for the most part works, it just doesn't meet the prior high standards.

Note: Spoilers for books 1-2 below

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Wednesday, September 2, 2020

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Seven Devils by Laura Lam and Elizabeth May



Seven Devils is the first in a new space opera duology by authors Laura Lam and Elizabeth May.  I haven't read any of May's other works, but I did find really interesting Lam's solo published work from earlier this year, the feminist SF novel "Goldilocks."  Seven Devils is also described by the press marketing as "Feminist Space Opera", and received some positive push from other writers I followed, so I tried to get a copy through NetGalley when it was posted there (I was rejected) and put it on my TBR pile when it came out.

And I have very odd feelings about Seven Devils - I really liked it for most of its page-length, with some strong characters and a strong setting, which made it hard for me to not finish it all in one day (it took me two).  On the other hand, perhaps because I didn't quite realize it was a duology, I really hated the book's eventual ending, which ends not just on a tremendous cliffhanger, but in a really dark place that felt somehow out of tone - even for a book in which the heroines are fighting against an evil fascist Empire that controls its citizens often with a mind controlling AI.  The result just wasn't really satisfying for me, which gave me a bit of a bad taste in my mouth, even though I enjoyed nearly everything up to that point and would almost certainly read the concluding half of this duology.


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SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Deal with the Devil by Kit Rocha


Deal with the Devil is the first in a new series by Kit Rocha - a psuedonym for authors Donna Herren and Bree Bridges.  They're mostly known for their long running post apocalyptic erotic SF series "Beyond", and this novel is the first in their "Mercenary Librarians" series...which is also post apocalyptic romantic SciFi.  I've read one half of the Rocha on twitter a bit and have come to really enjoy romantic and sexy parts of the genre, so despite originally skipping over this novel, I decided to give this one a try and put on a library hold.

And Deal with the Devil is a blast - a sexy as hell post apocalyptic romp as a pair of sets of super soldiers - 4 mechanically augmented men and 3 biologically engineered women - go on a journey through a post apocalyptic US and their leaders try desperately not to act on their own attraction....and well, fail utterly.  The book is incredibly fun and quotable, and yes, very damn sexy, with two strong main characters to go with a solid support cast, who it appears will be explored as main characters of subsequent books.  And yeah I'll be there for sure (I've also downloaded the first in Rocha's erotic series because well....yes).


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Tuesday, September 1, 2020

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: The Dawnhounds by Sascha Stronach



The Dawnhounds is a SF/F novel by Kiwi author Sascha Stronach, and the winner of this year's Sir Julius Vogel Award for best SF/F novel from New Zealand in 2019.  Those who don't keep up with the fandom of the genre might not have known that the Hugo Awards - one of the biggest awards in the genre - were awarded this year in New Zealand at WorldCon, with the awards going to some great works but the actual ceremony and convention being an utter mess (to put it mildly).  One annoyance in particular was that the virtual ceremony included no celebration of the local scene at all, with the Sir Julius Vogel Awards essentially grafted onto another award ceremony in a way so as to give it little viewership (among other problems again).  So I was rather curious to actually check out The Dawnhounds to see what fandom had essentially missed out on, and as it was in Kindle Unlimited, it was an easy choice to obtain.

And The Dawnhounds is.....interesting.  One on hand it's a SF/F story with very strong themes, with a bi main character who became a cop to try and do some good in a corrupt system that upholds a hetero-norm, and in death obtains magic and discovers a whole other world of queerness that the guardians of the norms seek to obhold....that also throws in odd concepts like technology and magic being mostly biological in nature and some odd perhaps dead gods with their own agendas into the mix.  On the other hand, the book starts with its lead heroine getting high on opiates and thus being an insanely unreliable narrator, and even after she gets sober early on isn't particularly clear as to what exactly is happening at any given moment, as she stumbles around without a clue for much of the story.  This is not a story where the author finds a way to directly explain concepts to the reader, and it didn't quite work for me as much as I'd wanted as a result.  Still, it's again certainly an interesting read, and I'd be very curious to read a sequel to see how things move on from there.


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