Monday, January 12, 2009
In the interests of actually having a 2008 roundup before the end of January I'm going to try very hard to catch up this week. Onward!
I really loved China Mieville's Perdido Street Station despite the, uh, "insect p0rn" as my friend so delicately put it, that happens in the first chapter. Sure, it was a little overwrought at times and the style could be a bit much, but once I rolled my eyes a few times and adjusted to it I definitely got caught up in the story of a rogue scientist attempting to make a creature stripped of its wings fly again. There was genuine terror during the attack scenes and I was anxious and upset at certain developments. There was great world building and I went right out and bought more of Mieville's books.
I loved Clare B Dunkle's trilogy that I read last year, so I was excited to read The Sky Inside, but unfortunately it wasn't terribly original science fiction. It was slow to get started with lots of set up and not a lot of action. I will probably read the sequel, but I won't rush to get it or anything.
I watched Blood Ties when it was on TV because I can't not watch a TV show with vampires. I figured I should read the Tanya Huff books it was based on, but when I discovered she had a trilogy featuring a gay wizard who worked on a syndicated vampire TV show filmed in Canada (Hee!) I knew those were the ones for me instead. Turns out the main character was a spin-off from the vampire books and Henry, the main vampire, was also in these. Smoke And Shadows was the first one and it wasn't great writing and definitely a little silly, but it was a fast and enjoyable read anyway. Plus surprise Bi!Henry, so that was cool. The next one, Smoke And Mirrors was way better than the first with some genuinely creepy moments and was probably my favorite of the three. Smoke And Ashes finished up the trilogy and was better than I expected. I'm sure I'll get around to her vampire books at some point.
More vampires! (It seems to be a recurring theme this year.) I actually couldn't wait to get Charlaine Harris' From Dead To Worse because of the huge cliffhanger from the last book, but it felt like an attempt to bridge the gap between the fall out from the last book and the setup to the next book rather than a novel with its own storyline.
Heck, might as well finish up with Stephanie Meyer. Breaking Dawn was probably my least favorite of the series, if time taken to read it is any indication. This one took me at least three days versus the three or four hours each of the other books in the series did. I was never particularly attached to the characters so I didn't have strong feelings one way or another about the way it ended. I did actually genuinely like The Host though. I liked the conceit, the world building, the point of view, etc. The writing still isn't great and the characters could use more oomph, but I hope she does a sequel.
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I really loved China Mieville's Perdido Street Station despite the, uh, "insect p0rn" as my friend so delicately put it, that happens in the first chapter. Sure, it was a little overwrought at times and the style could be a bit much, but once I rolled my eyes a few times and adjusted to it I definitely got caught up in the story of a rogue scientist attempting to make a creature stripped of its wings fly again. There was genuine terror during the attack scenes and I was anxious and upset at certain developments. There was great world building and I went right out and bought more of Mieville's books.
I loved Clare B Dunkle's trilogy that I read last year, so I was excited to read The Sky Inside, but unfortunately it wasn't terribly original science fiction. It was slow to get started with lots of set up and not a lot of action. I will probably read the sequel, but I won't rush to get it or anything.
I watched Blood Ties when it was on TV because I can't not watch a TV show with vampires. I figured I should read the Tanya Huff books it was based on, but when I discovered she had a trilogy featuring a gay wizard who worked on a syndicated vampire TV show filmed in Canada (Hee!) I knew those were the ones for me instead. Turns out the main character was a spin-off from the vampire books and Henry, the main vampire, was also in these. Smoke And Shadows was the first one and it wasn't great writing and definitely a little silly, but it was a fast and enjoyable read anyway. Plus surprise Bi!Henry, so that was cool. The next one, Smoke And Mirrors was way better than the first with some genuinely creepy moments and was probably my favorite of the three. Smoke And Ashes finished up the trilogy and was better than I expected. I'm sure I'll get around to her vampire books at some point.
More vampires! (It seems to be a recurring theme this year.) I actually couldn't wait to get Charlaine Harris' From Dead To Worse because of the huge cliffhanger from the last book, but it felt like an attempt to bridge the gap between the fall out from the last book and the setup to the next book rather than a novel with its own storyline.
Heck, might as well finish up with Stephanie Meyer. Breaking Dawn was probably my least favorite of the series, if time taken to read it is any indication. This one took me at least three days versus the three or four hours each of the other books in the series did. I was never particularly attached to the characters so I didn't have strong feelings one way or another about the way it ended. I did actually genuinely like The Host though. I liked the conceit, the world building, the point of view, etc. The writing still isn't great and the characters could use more oomph, but I hope she does a sequel.
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