Reading Wednesday Near Miss

[chomiji]

Yesterday I had to finish some other things. So here's books on Thursday instead.

I finished Exit Strategy: The Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells, and it was pretty good: a worthy finish to this series of novellas. Murderbot has to extract a hostage: always the best type of action scenario, as I learned long ago when I used to run RPG tournaments. (Grabbing treasure and running is pretty trivial by comparison.) There's also the question of whether its allies are more trouble than they're worth. The story rolls along fast and ends bittersweetly.

Then, down with a cold, I powered through Lies Sleeping, the latest Rivers of London installment by Ben Aaronovitch. Wow, that was good! I had the feeling Aaronovitch had been basically stringing out events for the last couple of books until he could arrive at this place in the story, because this was much, much meatier and more interesting than this series has been for a while, As I noted on Book of Faces, there was one place near the end where I dropped my Kindle into my lap and applauded. This would make a reasonable stopping place for the series, but Wikipedia says there will be more.

Now I'm about halfway through The Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal. I picked this up as Hugo reading. I'd been going back and forth on whether to read it until I saw it mentioned in the Hugo context. I'm a little ambivalent about it. It's a compelling story and I like the viewpoint character, but every time I put it down, I find myself thinking it's not my thing. I think it may be Kowal's writing style, and it may even be deliberate. It feels very much like a mainstream novel, and that may be the effect she wants.

The next several new reads will probably all be Hugo stuff: nominations close March 16. If you have any suggestions for SF&F novels or graphic novels published in 2018 that you think I would like, please mention them. Other Hugo-eligible things I've already read are:

• Revenant Gun by Yoon Ha Lee
• Record of a Spaceborn Few by Becky Chambers
• Trail of Lightning by Rebecca Roanhorse

I have volume 3 of Monstress (graphic novel) Marjorie Liu and Sana Takeda in hand but I have not read it yet.

Comments

[hamsterwoman]

Wow, that was good! I had the feeling Aaronovitch had been basically stringing out events for the last couple of books until he could arrive at this place in the story, because this was much, much meatier and more interesting than this series has been for a while,

I also found it really good and way more satisfying than any book since Broken Homes. It does feel like a natural stopping point, or at least arc wrap.

I enjoyed Calculating Stars -- Elma and the worldbuilding and MRK's writing style -- so it's on my Hugo list, along with Lies Sleeping and Revenant Gun.

Other Hugo-eligible things I've read: I really liked Naomi Novik's Spinning Silver and Tom Miller's Philosopher's Flight (they're on my nominations list). I also read Consuming Fire, sequel to Scalzi's Hugo-nominated Collapsing Empire, but liked it a lot less than the first book. Hoping to get to Trail of Lightning, Alexandra Rowland's A Conspiracy of Truths, R.F.Huang's The Poppy War, and maybe Bennet's Foundryside before mid-March. (Huang and Rowland are Campbell-eligible, too.)

I'm not sure about graphic novel myself... I've read several, but wasn't really feeling it -- Saga 9 disappointed me, as did Paper Girls 4. I read Rainbow Rowell's Runaways, and they were fine, but I don't think I can appreciate them properly. There are the RoL comics, and I did enjoy Cry Fox, but that's never going to make the ballot anyway... (I read Monstress 2 for Hugo homework last year, and I totally get why it won, but it's just not my thing.)

[rushthatspeaks]

Have you read Tillie Walden's On a Sunbeam? I would love to see it on the Hugo ballot. Gorgeously drawn, sweet coming-of-age story with subtle and interesting worldbuilding.