It is a mystery

For some reason I thought I had made a post for September but apparently not. I wouldn't hold my DNF books against them during this time, I was very tired and not feeling books that might have normally been decent, so probably most of them are perfectly good reads. I re-read a lot of books and fanfiction during this time including the entirety of the HOTE Ao3 tag, twice at least. Then I started on re-reading the Goblin Emperor Ao3 fic. Then I started going back through Murderbot fic. So you get the gist. New books had to be incredibly good for me to finish them. 

Read

•  Bad Company by Megan Greenwell - a book about private equity. I didn't technically finish this book but I got the gist. private equity is so fucked up and shouldn't exist. library e-book
• At the Feet of the Sun by Victoria Goddard - this was the first time I read this book, I re-read it about a month ago again. physical book I bought
• Lakelore by Anna-Marie McLemore - decent little book, really liked it. library audiobook
• Hemlock and Silver by T Kingfisher - hey what the fuck. it was good. but what the fuck. I wasn't at all bothered by the demon horse in the last fairytale retelling but the leggy guys are fucked up in this. you should read it. library ebook
• Queen Demon by Martha Wells - not as tightly timelined as Witch King but definitely got me in the feels more. physical book I pre-ordered
• Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz - cute little scifi book, just chill. library ebook
• Portrait of the Wide Seas Islander by Victoria Goddard - little novella in the HOTE series, very good, enjoyed it. physical book I bought. also re-read
• Petty Treasons by Victoria Goddard - little novella in HOTE series, very good, deeply in the feels about it. physical book I bought. also re-read
• The Return of Fitzroy Angursell by Victoria Goddard - little novella in the HOTE series, fun and funny and in the feels about it again. physical book I bought. also re-read
• Those Who Hold the Fire by Victoria Goddard - little novella in the HOTE series, very good. physical book I bought. 

Re-read

• Network Effect by Martha Wells - library audiobook. the narrator is excellent for this series and I love murderbot so much
• Witch King by Martha Wells - library audiobook - I finally learned how many of the characters names were actually pronounced
• Fugitive Telemetry by Martha Wells - library audiobook
• System Collapse by Martha Wells - library audiobook, clearly I was on a roll
• Hands of the Emperor by Victora Goddard

DNF

• When the Tides Held the Moon by Venessa Vida Kelley - not sure why I wasn't into it, but felt decently YA in a way that was irritating me even though I think the protags were supposed to be in their twenties maybe. I dunno, this was back in August. Library audiobook
• Dark Moon, Shallow Sea by David R Slayton - no idea what I didn't like about it, probably just wasn't feeling it. library e-book
• War Girls by Tochi Onyebuchi - I might try this one again later. library e-book
• The City and Its Uncertain Walls by Haruki Murakami - not feeling it, library audiobook
• Apprentice to the Villain by Hannah Nicole Maehrer- I remember the first book being decent and funny, found the first chapter of this extremely irritating due to love-sick POV character. library audiobook
• Lies We Sing to the Sea by Sarah Underwood - decent story, I could see where the romance was going and I didn't like it. library audiobook
• Motheater by Linda H Codega - really really liked this one's story and got through 2/3 of it, but the romance was annoying me, will probably go back and finish it. library ebook

Read

• Activation Degradation by Marina J. Lostetter - excellent sci-fi book, some very fucked up stuff, very good. Library e-book
• The Saint of Bright Doors by Vajra Chandrasekera - my god this book was incredible. wild. so vivid. just so good. the narrator was excellent as well. library audiobook
• The Siren, the Song and the Spy by Maggie Tokuda-Hall - extremely interesting worldbuilding, neato plot, lots of queer people and mermaids. packs a lot into a novelette. library e-book
• When Gods Die by C.S Harris - second in the series, decent murder mystery. physical library book
• Greenteeth by Molly O'Neil - omg I loved this so much. the narrator was very good, there is epic quests and friendship and aaaaaa. library audiobook
• Deadbeat Druid by David R. Slayton - it's really been too long since I read the first two in the series, so I didn't actually remember any of the plot. decent anyway. library e-book
• To Shape A Dragon's Breath by Moniquill Blackgoose - holy shit you guys, this book was really good. very "this person stands up against the colonial power and succeeds" but it was really cool world building and very enjoyable to read. library e-book
• The Incandescent by Emily Tesh - extremely extremely good. lots of british private school nonsense but that's easily skimmable. plot got extremely good. library e-book

Re-read

• Uprooted by Naomi Novik - more intense than I remembered, very good. physical library book

DNF

• Isabella Nagg and the Pot of Basil - clearly going for Pratchett style humor, not actually my jam and half of the jokes are in footnotes which don't work well on my phone to click. library e-book
• The Secret Lives of Country Gentlemen by KJ Charles - not the author's fault, but I'm pretty sure the audiobook was being read by a computer. There were really weird pauses in the middle of sentences that shouldn't be there and I couldn't get through five minutes of it. Really weird. library audiobook

Read

• The River Has Roots by Amal El-Mohtar - absolutely wonderful sweet little book. Felt almost poetry like. Really nice. Library e-book
• The Orb of Cairado by Katherine Addison - mystery adventure book, enjoyed the exploration of the world of a relatively normal person. purchased e-book
• Emilie and the Hollow World by Martha Wells - YA vibes but the protag was slightly too old for the vibes I think. Not a bad little story though, absolutely bonkers worldbuilding stuff. Library -book
• The Gentlemen and his Vowsmith by Rebecca Ide - absolutely wonderful romance/magical murder mystery but I didn't realize the ebook had DRM so I could only read it on the publishers website. Absolutely infuriating since it didn't work well. Purchased e-book
• The Mirador by Katherine Addison - this book series is like a trainwreck, it's so weird but I couldn't stop reading. Third in the series. Library e-book

DNF

• The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu - Too much physics deep dives for me. Got about halfway through and it wasn't that interesting to me. Library e-book
• Home Grown Magic by Jamie Pacton - this is so tropey romance nonsense that I didn't even get through a quarter of it. library e-book

Re-read

• The Goblin Emperor - listen. My brain is obsessed. Purchased e-book
• The Witness for the Dead by Katherine Addison - library audiobook - first audiobook I got through while doing farmwork, even harder to track the names while listening but oh well. Enjoyed it though.
• All Systems Red by Martha Wells - library e-book

Read in Feb - e-books were kind to me this month. theme was new worlds

• Thornfruit by Felicia Dawn - really fascinating magic and fantasy world, pretty excited to read the rest of the triolgy - purchased ebook
• The Sapling Cage by Margaret Killjoy - trans girl joins local witch coven as the world turns on them, really pretty visceral, really good - library ebook
• A Desolation Called Peace by Arkady Martine - sequel to the extremely busy week, surprise surprise things have consequences but there are some scary aliens out there and shit gets wild - physical library book
• The Bangalore Detectives Club by Harini Nagendra - it took me a bit to get used to the writing style, set in 1920s India, very Sherlock Holmes era style, but excellent and really really good - library ebook
• Heavens Queen by Rachel Bach - omg the conclusion of this trilogy was so good and she took charge and all the names and blew shit up so there you go - physical library book
• Where the Dead Brides Gather by Nuzo Onoh - short book, different style than I'm used to but I enjoyed it - library ebook
• Melusine by Katherine Addison - incredibly good book, really neat magic stuff, super huge warning about the (AO3 rating scale) Mature rape scene that is really close to the start of the book. library e-book
• The Last Hour Between Worlds by Melissa Caruso - fancy murder party, magic and inception if it was 12 layers deep. so fucking awesome. and lesbians. library e-book
• Murder Under a Red Moon by Harini Nagendra - next book in the series, nice detective book, did like - library e-book
• We Won't be Here Tomorrow and Other Stories by Margaret Killjoy - a bunch of short stories, extremely good but sad because none of them are full length books. library e-book
• Godkiller by Hannah Kaner - omg, extremely cool gods and magic and mystery and politics and more. really really good. library e-book
• Water Horse by Melissa Scott - a people slowly losing a generational war and how they deal with it. very cool world and just some magic. purchased e-book

Reread

• A Sorceress Comes to Call by T. Kingfisher - I like this a lot and I've read it a lot - library e-book

DNF

• Tehrangeles by Porochista Khakpour - a book about four of the most irritating people in the world and two vaguely interesting people, fine if you like to read the inner thoughts of self absorbed rich people, I despised them - library e book

Not a ton of reading in December but I was very focused on sewing and fiber projects, that post coming soon

Read in December

• The Red Stained Wings by Elizabeth Bear - second in the series, I love this world so much, it's so cool
• Mirrored Heavens by Rebecca Roanhorse - the final book of the trilogy. it has been so long since I read the first two that I couldn't remember who anyone was or what the writing style was, so the first half was a slog. there was so many people talking bleh
• The Origin of Storms by Elizabeth Bear - final in the Lotus Kingdoms series, so good!!! There was intrigue and stuff but it was in between all the action and it was relatively quick
• The Shoestring Theory by Mariana Costa - this book is a wacky one, but kinda wild. people do lots of shenanigans with magic

Reread

• The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison - it's so good
• The Scholomance series by Naomi Novik - this is a once a year re-read because I like it so much

Read

• Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo - incredibly good, the bad guys make the best thieves style heist movie. Set in fantasy Holland which was incredibly amusing at first. Logically I know the Dutch were an empire at one point, but they aren't as recent an empire as the british (to an american eye hmm), so it feels really weird. But it really works and the story and characters are excellent. Set in a universe that is apparently popular enough to get a netflix series, will read those books later. library e-book
• Raven Strategem by Yoon Ha Lee - I still don't get the space/calendar/math stuff but hell yeah let's destroy a space cult empire from the inside. library e-book
• Flux by Jinwoo Chong - time goes weird and awful and human experimentation is bad actually. physical library book
• Crooked Kingdom by Leigh Bardugo - second after Six of Crows and it's just a duology yay. Wraps many things up and leaves it nice and ambiguous for future books/fanfiction. Excellent as the first one. library e-book
• Someone You Can Build a Nest in by John Wiswell - cute but extremely gross descriptions of things, otherwise a sweet little story. Good but gross, decent amount of body horror if you think about it too much. physical library book
• He Who Drowned the World by Shelley Parker-Chan - It took me a long time to slog through this. First issue is that I read the first book too long ago to remember almost any of the characters. Second, it has a slow start. But a really good conclusion to the duology. library e-book
• The Annual Migration of Clouds by Premee Mohamed - really awesome novella, very visceral feeling post-apocolypse but like 100 years ago apocolypse. Can't wait to read the second one. physical library book'
• The Unrelenting Earth by Kritika H. Rao - The floating city nearly falls about a thousand times. I'm not sure I'd recommend this series. I think I'll read the third one just to find out the overarching plot but there's a lot of dead people so far and everyone is really dramatic in every possible way. Like, they could have had a conversation but no, they're busy and the misunderstandings pile up. Hmm. library e-book
• Barrayar by Lois McMaster Bujold - one woman gets fed up and solves a problem. efficiently. delightful, very good, thoroughly enjoyable. physical library book
• Escape Velocity by Victor Manibo - they're rich, in space, connected by the past and some shit is going down. fun read, not very deep. physical library book
• Assassin of Reality by Marina and Sergey Dyachenko - now that I'm typing this, I don't think I remember how this ended I was reading it on the train home at the end of the Raleigh trip and I was very tired. Hmm. I remember that it was good, no details though. ah well. physical library book

Re-read

• Most Ardently by Gabe Cole Novoa - it's a sweet little book. library e-book

DNF

• Navola by Paolo Bacigalupi - only read this book if you enjoy things like multiple page descriptions of the city and all the different merchant people they rode past. I got a quarter of the way through and was bored out of my mind. more like a les mis or lotr experience. very little dragons in that first quarter of the book. library e-book
• All that She Carried by Tiya Miles - I wanted to like this book, but I don't know if it's because I don't read a lot of non-fiction or what, but I was very bored by this. Too much research in it maybe? I think it might not have been for me. library e-book

Oh god it's July already

Read in June

•  The Final Strife by Saara El-Arifi - solid fantasy world that gets a lot more interesting as the book goes on. I found the main character annoying and not super relatable at first, but her backstory explains a lot as it's revealed. More of a YA flavor - library e-book
• Uprooted by Naomi Novik - I tried reading this book back in 2021 and got to a part where they kissed when the mage held her captive and I threw it away in disgust but I'm glad I pushed through that because the rest of the story is way way better and gets incredibly wild
• Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik - really really amazing fairytale style fantasy book, I really enjoyed it - library e-book
• The Surviving Sky by Kritika H. Rao - holy shit this was good. Started out with a huge conflict between characters and they needed to make amends in order to save the planet and uncover the secrets of the world ending earthquakes. Extremely intense, very good, can't wait to read the sequels - library e-book
• Fire Logic by Laurie J. Marks - this book has everything, intrigue, genocide, magic, betrayal, the hero's journey, conflict between cultures, lesbians and other queers. really liked the writing style a lot, can't wait to read the next one in the series - library e-book
• Soulstar by C.L. Polk - third and final in the series, focuses on a really interesting character, and you know, they overthrow the monarchy and build a democracy. Like the review that finally got me to get reading the series again, each book gets gayer and more socialist as they go - physical library book
• Empire Ascendant by Kameron Hurley - second in the series, shit gets real, lots of characters die, very good making me give a shit about the various characters- physical library book

DNF

• To Gaze Upon WIcked Gods by Molly X. Chang - got about 40% into the book and was too annoyed by the main character and the interactions between what would probably become a love interest to continue.  - library e-book
• The Terraformers by Annalee Newitz - started out good, definitely an interesting idea, but quickly got annoyed by the tell not show of characters emotions in dialogue. Also how many times do you need to tell me that characters are disgusted by the idea of animals existing and providing things for humans. Some kind of weird vegan thing? I dunno.  - library e-book
• Shigidi and the Brass Head of Obalufon - Just couldn't get into the writing style and was annoyed by the characters - library e-book

Books read

• The Water Outlaws by S. L. Huang - solid fun book with adventures and such, based on various Chinese stories - physical library book
• Traitor's Gate by Kate Elliott - third and final in the series and it was great up until the very last bit, where they wrapped up most of the plots and introduced a few new ones but just didn't resolve those, so I don't know if there's more in the world but I was a bit disappointed in the end. physical library book
• In the Labyrinth of Drakes by Marie Brennan - another really good book in this series - physical library book
• The Diablo's Curse by Gabe Cole Novoa - thought this was going to be a book on releasing all the promises a demon made, turns out it was a romance with a little adventure. it was fine. library e-book
• The Mirror Empire by Kameron Hurley - big epic book one of three, lots of neat world building, culture class, great concepts and characters. library e-book
• Vera Wong's Unsolicited Advice for Murderers by Jesse Q. Sutanto - really fun little murder mystery story, characters really fun. library e-book
• Assistant to the Villain by Hannah Nicole Maehrer - really fun medieval fantasy with a bunch of shenanigans. library e-book
• Black Water Sister by Zen Cho - every book Zen Cho has written is very different and very good. This was a really good story. library e-book
• Dragonfall by L.R. Lam - really cool worldbuilding, first of three books apparently. library e-book
• Number Go Up by Zeke Faux - non fiction book about crypto, pretty good, blah ending. library e-book
• A Rival Most Vial by R.K. Ashwick - very legends and lattes vibes, don't look too close at the world building, just enjoy the silly nonsense and romance. library e-book

DNF 

• The Moonday Letters by Emmi Itaranta - didn't grab my attention enough to continue, I might give it another try later in the year - library e-book

 Read in January:

• The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon - omg this was an Epic. It was twice the length of any other book and it was such a cool entwined story of fantasy and magic. Super cool and really epic final battle. Library e-book
• Like Thunder by Nnedi Okorafor - a sequel to Shadow Speaker and really really good Library e-book
• And What Can We Offer You Tonight by Premee Mohammed - novella, short story ? length, quick little read that was amazingly good and beautiful Library e-book
• Uncanny Magazine Issue 35 Library e-book
• A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine - a new ambassador to an empire has an EXTREMELY busy week, really really good  Library e-book
• The Bone Shard Daughter by Andrea Stewart - first of a trilogy, really great fantasy set up, really compelling and some fucked up stuff  Library e-book
• Most Ardently by Gabe Cole Novoa - Really really really good and augh much feelings Library e-book
• Latest issue of Spin Off Magazine Library e-book
• The Bone Shard Emperor by Andrea Stewart - second in the trilogy, more and more fucked up stuff happening, very good Library e-book
• Second Chances in New Port Stephan by TJ Alexander - really sweet and fun little romance book Library e-book
• Spindle's End by Robin McKinley - I'm really surprised I never read this book before considering how much I read some of McKinley's other books. A really good book about found family and magic and changing fates. Double appreciation for the spinning details. Physical library book
• Far From the Light of Heaven by Tade Thompson - incredibly wild story of a colony ship trip gone incredibly horribly wrong, locked room murder mystery Physical library book

Re-read

• Sorcerer to the Crown by Zen Cho - accidental re-read, I thought, oh I love Zen Cho's stuff and about halfway through I realized I ahd read this before. Delightfully good re-read, fun little story Physical library book

DNF

• The Grace of Kings by Ken Liu - I loved Babel so much but this one was so wildly different in tone. I didn't really like the characters and I think this is some other type of story, more like a tale of legends than a story of a person.  Library e-book

I read Detransition, Baby by Torrey Peters and my opinion on it was that this book was not written for me( Read more... )