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What I Finished Reading This Week
The Grief of Stones – Katherine Addison
I liked this one a lot. It finds Addison on much surer footing with her protagonist and setting than with its predecessor, The Witness for the Dead, which was a much thinner read for me (although one I did enjoy more during my second read-through). Part of this is because Addison has an overarching theme for this novel; namely, the ways society fails to protect vulnerable women, compared to the previous volume, whose theme one might sum up as "Opera is awesome (also some murders)." Part of this is because my copy of the novel finally arrived this Friday, making said theme far more resonant than it would have been a week ago.
Much of this is because while The Grief of Stones is packaged as the second entry in a trilogy of books, it's really just the middle section of a single novel, and so the setting, lore, and cast of characters are finally coming into their own. (Don't believe me? Imagine how much less compelling The Goblin Emperor would have been had Tor published it as three independent volumes, with the first concluding after "Dinner with the Goblin Ambassador.") We finally start to see enough of characters like Anora, Azhanharad, and Ulzhavel, and Celehar's interactions with them, that they begin to feel like individuals in their own rights. (And oh how I love the deft hand with which Addison writes Celehar-the-unreliable-narrator.) Ditto the buildings, locations, and subcultures of Amalo. Ditto the Hill of Werewolves. The newly introduced secondary characters--particularly Tomasaran, but also the scholars--are freaking awesome, much more three-dimensional from the outset than were many of the newly introduced characters in Witness.
Having sufficiently established these elements, Addison is now free to have fun with them...and she does, as evidenced by the frequent sly humor and snappy dialogue. She's also taken more care to avoid sloppiness with linguistic registers and retcons of the original Goblin Emperor world than she did in Witness. (And, on a purely personal level, as one of a very few genres of music that leaves me absolutely cold, I did not bemoan this volume's lack of endless descriptions of opera.)
Grief does a much better job of blending its major plot arcs (which are also better developed here than those in Witness) with its slice-of-life and set piece vignettes. Its noir genre conventions (expository recaps, summaries of off-screen interactions or traveling from A to B to investigate C, etc.) are less obvious as such. In short, this is a much smoother, surer, and more entertaining read than its predecessor. It made me excited for the characters and the world they inhabit, and I want the next volume now, please.
Upright Women Wanted – Sarah Gailey
Gailey’s stuff is always a weird mixed bag for me: there are elements that I really like and elements that absolutely do not work for me, and very little in between; Upright Women Wanted continued that experience.
It’s basically a novella-length version of Anna North’s Outlawed: female protagonist fleeing the patriarchy in a post-apocalyptic Wild West dystopia joins traveling band of queer woman outlaws. Gailey’s descriptive language and dialogue really did it for me: they have the ambiance of the Great Plains and the vernacular English of the time period down pat. But the obligatory romance and overall plot were both rushed, to the novella’s detriment. There’s no chemistry between the leads (to say nothing of the fact that falling in instalove with someone you've just met, on the strength of their superficial characteristics, a few days after your long-term partner is murdered by the state? Not a good look for a main character). Additionally, the protagonists do several nonsensical things because that’s the fastest way for Gailey to get them from A to B. Final verdict: I liked some parts of this one. It had potential, but it couldn't capitalize on it due to its abbreviated length.
What I Finished Reading One Week Ago
Triangle – Mac Barnett and Jon Klassen
How much do I love this book? As much as Square is afraid of ten million snakes!
What I Finished Reading Two Weeks Ago
Monstress vol. 5 – Marjorie Liu & Sana Takeda
The art remains stunning, stunning, stunning, and the reason why I read this series. I found the plot to be slightly more comprehensible than in earlier volumes, largely because much of it happens on an individual level (e.g., by depicting individual characters' experiences of a major battle, or flashbacks to their pasts). I’ll move on to volume six, but man, I need a robust Wikipedia page to help me figure out what is going on with the overall plot, and said page does not exist.
What I Finished Reading Three Weeks Ago
Lucifer: Book 1 – Mike Carey et al.
This volume collects the first 16 issues of this Carey-authored Sandman spinoff series. I’m sure the plot and execution would have been mindblowing to 15-year-old boys in the late 90s when said issues were originally published. Readers in 2022 are likely to find them dated and boringly predictable.
What I Am Currently Reading
Holly Black – The Book of Night
I pick it up, get really into it while I’m reading it, and then put it down and don’t feel any urge to return to it.
White Mare, Red Stallion – Diana L. Paxson
I’m really loving the prose in this one.
Dracula – Bram Stoker
The plot is getting a wee bit ridiculous by late June.
Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World – Jack Weatherford
I’m about 2/3 of the way through this one.
Artificial Condition – Martha Wells
I’m really enjoying this one.
Imbibe – David Wondrich
Much more engagingly written than I would have anticipated. That said, I’ve just not been in the mood for nonfiction the past week or so, so this one is on pause.
What I Still Have Left To Review: Seraphina – Rachel Hartman
What I’m Reading Next
This week I picked up (and finished) Katherine Addison’s The Grief of Stones, Melissa Albert’s Our Crooked Hearts, The Widow Queen by Elzbieta Cherezinska (courtesy of Tor), Elektra by Jennifer Saint, and Threads of Awakening by Leslie Rinchen-Wongmo. Two weeks ago, I picked up The Fallen Stones by R. J. Grove and The Land of the Young by Will Robinson.
これで以上です。
The Grief of Stones – Katherine Addison
I liked this one a lot. It finds Addison on much surer footing with her protagonist and setting than with its predecessor, The Witness for the Dead, which was a much thinner read for me (although one I did enjoy more during my second read-through). Part of this is because Addison has an overarching theme for this novel; namely, the ways society fails to protect vulnerable women, compared to the previous volume, whose theme one might sum up as "Opera is awesome (also some murders)." Part of this is because my copy of the novel finally arrived this Friday, making said theme far more resonant than it would have been a week ago.
Much of this is because while The Grief of Stones is packaged as the second entry in a trilogy of books, it's really just the middle section of a single novel, and so the setting, lore, and cast of characters are finally coming into their own. (Don't believe me? Imagine how much less compelling The Goblin Emperor would have been had Tor published it as three independent volumes, with the first concluding after "Dinner with the Goblin Ambassador.") We finally start to see enough of characters like Anora, Azhanharad, and Ulzhavel, and Celehar's interactions with them, that they begin to feel like individuals in their own rights. (And oh how I love the deft hand with which Addison writes Celehar-the-unreliable-narrator.) Ditto the buildings, locations, and subcultures of Amalo. Ditto the Hill of Werewolves. The newly introduced secondary characters--particularly Tomasaran, but also the scholars--are freaking awesome, much more three-dimensional from the outset than were many of the newly introduced characters in Witness.
Having sufficiently established these elements, Addison is now free to have fun with them...and she does, as evidenced by the frequent sly humor and snappy dialogue. She's also taken more care to avoid sloppiness with linguistic registers and retcons of the original Goblin Emperor world than she did in Witness. (And, on a purely personal level, as one of a very few genres of music that leaves me absolutely cold, I did not bemoan this volume's lack of endless descriptions of opera.)
Grief does a much better job of blending its major plot arcs (which are also better developed here than those in Witness) with its slice-of-life and set piece vignettes. Its noir genre conventions (expository recaps, summaries of off-screen interactions or traveling from A to B to investigate C, etc.) are less obvious as such. In short, this is a much smoother, surer, and more entertaining read than its predecessor. It made me excited for the characters and the world they inhabit, and I want the next volume now, please.
Upright Women Wanted – Sarah Gailey
Gailey’s stuff is always a weird mixed bag for me: there are elements that I really like and elements that absolutely do not work for me, and very little in between; Upright Women Wanted continued that experience.
It’s basically a novella-length version of Anna North’s Outlawed: female protagonist fleeing the patriarchy in a post-apocalyptic Wild West dystopia joins traveling band of queer woman outlaws. Gailey’s descriptive language and dialogue really did it for me: they have the ambiance of the Great Plains and the vernacular English of the time period down pat. But the obligatory romance and overall plot were both rushed, to the novella’s detriment. There’s no chemistry between the leads (to say nothing of the fact that falling in instalove with someone you've just met, on the strength of their superficial characteristics, a few days after your long-term partner is murdered by the state? Not a good look for a main character). Additionally, the protagonists do several nonsensical things because that’s the fastest way for Gailey to get them from A to B. Final verdict: I liked some parts of this one. It had potential, but it couldn't capitalize on it due to its abbreviated length.
What I Finished Reading One Week Ago
Triangle – Mac Barnett and Jon Klassen
How much do I love this book? As much as Square is afraid of ten million snakes!
What I Finished Reading Two Weeks Ago
Monstress vol. 5 – Marjorie Liu & Sana Takeda
The art remains stunning, stunning, stunning, and the reason why I read this series. I found the plot to be slightly more comprehensible than in earlier volumes, largely because much of it happens on an individual level (e.g., by depicting individual characters' experiences of a major battle, or flashbacks to their pasts). I’ll move on to volume six, but man, I need a robust Wikipedia page to help me figure out what is going on with the overall plot, and said page does not exist.
What I Finished Reading Three Weeks Ago
Lucifer: Book 1 – Mike Carey et al.
This volume collects the first 16 issues of this Carey-authored Sandman spinoff series. I’m sure the plot and execution would have been mindblowing to 15-year-old boys in the late 90s when said issues were originally published. Readers in 2022 are likely to find them dated and boringly predictable.
What I Am Currently Reading
Holly Black – The Book of Night
I pick it up, get really into it while I’m reading it, and then put it down and don’t feel any urge to return to it.
White Mare, Red Stallion – Diana L. Paxson
I’m really loving the prose in this one.
Dracula – Bram Stoker
The plot is getting a wee bit ridiculous by late June.
Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World – Jack Weatherford
I’m about 2/3 of the way through this one.
Artificial Condition – Martha Wells
I’m really enjoying this one.
Imbibe – David Wondrich
Much more engagingly written than I would have anticipated. That said, I’ve just not been in the mood for nonfiction the past week or so, so this one is on pause.
What I Still Have Left To Review: Seraphina – Rachel Hartman
What I’m Reading Next
This week I picked up (and finished) Katherine Addison’s The Grief of Stones, Melissa Albert’s Our Crooked Hearts, The Widow Queen by Elzbieta Cherezinska (courtesy of Tor), Elektra by Jennifer Saint, and Threads of Awakening by Leslie Rinchen-Wongmo. Two weeks ago, I picked up The Fallen Stones by R. J. Grove and The Land of the Young by Will Robinson.
これで以上です。
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