Bookish Thoughts

This was one of three free novellas provided by Tor.com this month. It was bundled with A Psalm for the Wild Build and Unlocked which highlighted the similarities between the three stories. All of them concern a future where humanity is grappling with mechanical life. In Chambers' story, the robots achieved sentience and abandoned humans to their own devices, only for a human and robot to reconnect centuries later. In Scalzi's story, robots are provided as disability aids. They're fully controlled by humans who can't otherwise participate in society. This story is a bit more classic, with robots serving as a labor force and humanity beginning to grapple with how to extend rights to them. All three books ask what it means to be a person, but this one asks that question the most directly. A robot has been convicted of murder and a new lawyer decides to file an appeal, believing he didn't get a fair trial the first time around. Questions arise about the equality betw...

I read Scalzi's Lock In right at the beginning of the pandemic. It posits a future world, about twenty years after a pandemic has come through, killing 1% of the population and leaving another 1% paralyzed. It ended up being a lot lighter than I expected, which was for the best given my whole state of mind at that time. But this companion book takes a closer look at the pandemic itself and the immediate response and aftermath. The crazy part is that it was written in 2014, and still got a bunch of stuff right. It's always so weird when science fiction starts to read more like historical fiction. It becomes a fun exercise in looking at which predictions were correct and which were wrong. Scalzi's pandemic hit the globe much more consistently, having started at an international scientific conference. So the initial impact is a lot bigger. But it still comes in waves, like the real pandemic did. And there's still an incredible rallying of everyone. Another interesting dif...

I loved this book, and it's only further fueling my love of Becky Chambers. She's writes these quiet, gentle, speculative stories that deal with heavy philosophical questions. At the heart of this one is the quest for purpose. How do you find it, and do you need to? Is simply living enough? If it is enough, could you call that your purpose?  It's an interesting, circular argument. One that isn't terribly important to me because I know where I stand on it - living my little life in my little corner of the universe is enough for me. I don't need to strive for something more or bigger. But that's not true of the protagonist of this book, who feels woefully unfulfilled and spends most of the book trying to fill a hole in himself with some grand purpose. What I really loved is the mundanity of this hole. Dex cam from a loving family and found a supportive community. They are excellent at their chosen profession and seem to want for nothing. But, somehow, it isn't...

I gotta say, I struggled a lot with this novella. It started and ended very strongly. But the middle was so muddled I had a hard time following what was going on. I think it would have benefited from a longer length, which would have allowed for smoother transitions and some more background information. Then again, the jumpy transitions were kind of the point, as that folded in with the powers of one of the protagonists. I'd probably appreciate this book more if I read it again, though I'm not sure I ever will. I can see that it's important, and I'm trying to figure out whether I'm the intended audience or not. Was this meant to be a teaching book (making me part of the intended audience) or something more internal (and so not necessarily for me). It's probably that it was the latter but sold as the former, which is the root of my unmet expectations. At the least, it has me wanting to learn more about our justice and prison system.

I remember struggling a lot with LeGuin's books when I first began reading her. Every book felt like an argument. I never agreed with her fully, but I had to think hard to refine my own point of view, and I appreciated that. I always came out of her books feeling more sure of  myself for having thought deeper about the issues she presented. This book was different. I'm not sure if it's because my ideals have changed over the past decade or if I know what to expect from LeGuin now or is it's just where she was in her life, but this book was entirely on my wavelength. Like much of her work, it posits anarchy as an alternative to fascism and weaves in a healthy dose of feminism. Whatever it was, I loved this book. It might be my favorite of hers - though I think I also said that about the last LeGuin book. Maybe she's just converting me to her way of thinking.

 Now this is what I want from a Sanderson story. An interesting and sympathetic protagonist, a bit of a mystery and a problem to solve, a fascinating magical system with new applications around every corner, and hints of a much larger world around the edges of this self-contained story.  Sanderson has taken to writing these novellas between the much larger Stormlight novels, and it's a great way to dip back into the world and get reacquainted with it before committing to one of the massive tomes in the series proper. These stories follow side characters and side quests, making the world feel even more fleshed out and immense. This one in particular follows Rysn, first introduced as a minor character in The Way of Kings as she leads a mission to explore a forgotten island. Rock's daughter, Cord, and Bridge Four alum, Lopen, are included in the mission, and each has their own secondary goal that complicates things. But this isn't about people at odds with each other. It'...

 I've come to expect certain things from Alix E Harrow. A deep understanding of tropes and stories. A delight in playing with them. A strong sense of justice and equality. A strong, young woman (or women) fighting for change. Those are all present here. But this being a novella rather than a full novel, they're compressed and occasionally sketched in. I've read her other two books, so I can read between the lines here. But I still found myself wishing for something a little meatier in this Sleeping Beauty modernization. That's really more praise disguised as complaint. I love reading Harrow's work, and I just want more of it. There were some really interesting ideas here - stories being the connection between multiple dimensions, the bones of those stories remaining the same even as the details change, escaping (or not) from your own story. I'm excited that there's a sequel and I'll get to spend a bit more time in this world. Though I also hope that it i...

It's always a little rough when the best thing I can think to say about a book is that it was short. I hear a lot about Elizabeth Strout, and she's got a bunch of award-winning books. But it seems like every time I hear about someone raving about one of her books, it's the third or fourth in a series. Most recently, this happened with Oh, William. My book club nearly decided to read it. My mother-in-law's book club did decide to read it. And she liked it enough to go back and read the first two books. She waxed rhapsodic about this story that changes as the protagonist matures and gains new perspective on her childhood and comes to understand that trauma. And that may all be true. But the first book is (obviously) at the very beginning of that journey, and I had a hard time connecting with it. It was very melancholy, which I found off-putting. It felt like there was a wall between me and Lucy Barton. Every time she approached something interesting, she shied away from ...

Full disclosure: I went to high school with one of the authors of this novelette. This was an absolutely adorable story about the importance of connection and a nice reminder that life isn't over until it's over. Feral is an old dragon, more or less confined to his cave. He spends all his time reminiscing about the glory days, and complaining about everything around him. When a human girl arrives at his cave in need of rescuing, it jolts him out of his complacency.  There was a lot of fun humor in here, and Feral's journey from curmudgeonly loner to adoring grandfather-figure was fun. There were things I wanted to know more about (like Morsel's history), not because I felt like their lack took away from the story, just because I wanted more. But that's the sign of a perfect morsel - it leaves you wanting more.

This book is 100 pages long and it took me two weeks to read it because November was so non-stop. I liked it a lot. It's fun and comforting with a twist that I saw coming just in time. And one or two lines that reminded me why I love Lois McMaster Bujold so much. I just wish I'd been able to read it a bit quicker.

This was such a compelling little story. The premise is that every time Molly bleeds, the blood grows in to a clone of her that tries to kill her. There's no explanation for this, just a look at what would happen to a girl who grows up constantly having to kill herself. It's a weird story, but I really enjoyed reading it.

JY Yang is an absolute master at spinning out an epic tale in a very short space. This book is barely 100 pages long, yet it covers so much ground. It was surprisingly sad and incredibly complicated and continued the series' pattern of refusing to conform to a pattern. The emperor has finally died and the one who has spent half her life working to bring it about finds herself alone in a bar, contemplating her life. Well, not quite alone. She has an audience of one, the reader, to whom she tells her tale over drinks. This story was deft and incredible and I wish Yang were planning to write anything more in this world. I'm eagerly awaiting their next book, which won't be out until 2022.

I picked this one up again because I needed something light and quick and happy. It is still all of those things while also being wonderful and fun. This could easily become one of those go-to books whenever I need a bit of a pick-me-up

This was a wonderfully cozy little story about hanging out in the woods and falling in love unexpectedly. Then it got really sad. But then it got really happy again. I enjoyed reading it. It sent me through a delightful emotional journey and wrung out some of my grief. I'll definitely be picking up the sequel at some point. Probably.

This was another book about doing what little you can and letting that be enough. It follows a group of nuns living aboard a biological space ship (more slug than ship really) and administering what help they can at the edges of civilization. They perform happy deeds, like marriages and baptisms. They also perform harder deeds, like quarantining planets when plagues break out. They make hard decisions and they each struggle with their relationship with God and the church in their own way. But they all want to help as much as they can, even though they know that they can't change the whole world (or universe as the case may be).

The Penric and Desdemona novellas remain a lovely little slice of escapism. I'm glad that Bujold is continuing to write and publish them regularly. This is a world (like all of her worlds) where the people in charge are both generous and competent, which means that any problem is quickly solved and everyone gets a happy ever after. It makes for a wonderful fantasy world.  This one is about a plague, and I gotta say that it was interesting to read about a plague during a plague. Especially since this one only lasted a few weeks, while the real one has been going on for months. Still, some of the beats were similar, which the plague being better understood, the death rate going down even as the infection rate went up because they were learning how to handle it. Also, Penric's separation from his family (and new baby) both because he was so busy and because he didn't want to infect them was heartbreaking to read about. Also too relatable were his fears about contracting the di...

The fourth and final Murderbot novella brings the story back full circle. Murderbot reunites with the team from the first story, saving their leader and delivering some much needed information about their enemies. This book ends in nearly the same place as the first book, but now Murderbot is a little more knowledgable and a little more hopeful about what the future holds. I think I may have read this series too quickly, because by this book I was a little bit bored by the formula. I should have spaced them out a little more. But I've been eager to start Ann Leckie's Imperial Radch trilogy, which is similar enough to this series that I was having trouble reading them at the same time. So I sped through this one in an effort to finish it and ended up tainting my enjoyment a little bit. The story was still fun and fast-paced, and it was nice to see some familiar faces again. I just generally need a little more variety in what I read. That said, I am really excited to read the nov...

Sometimes, when you're dealing with the imminent death of a loved one, the thing that helps most is reading about death. Granted, the deaths here are fantastical and involve vampires, mad scientists, sea gods, and the sort of intense rivalry reserved for blood relatives. It was just far enough removed from reality to make it easy to read and become immersed in while still helping me to process all the emotions I've been rapidly cycling through lately. This book marks the triumphant (sort of) return of Jack and Jill, who are such great characters that they have now improbably returned twice and once more just might make the series jump the shark. But for now it was great to see them and spend a little more time in the Moors. But now McGuire has suitably built up the rest of the cast, and I'm excited to learn more about some of the other characters.

The third installment in Murderbot's story has Murderbot slowly discovering that robots can be friends. Friends with each other and friends with humans. But when I say slowly, I mean slowly. Murderbot isn't ready to put all the pieces together yet, even by the end of the story. But the reader can start to see how this is all falling into place. This was another thrilling adventure that circled back to some of the unanswered questions from the first book. I really like the way Wells is structuring this series, and I could honestly see it working really well as a television show. Things are building on each other well while everything remains exciting and fast-paced.

In the second book, Murderbot has finally fled from it's life as a SecUnit and is going digging in its past. Some time ago a job went really wrong, and the company did their best to erase Murderbot's memory. That's an imperfect process, and it's what pushed Murderbot to break free. But now it's time to find answers. Along the way, Murderbot meets an incredibly powerful ship named ART who may or may not become a friend. It's hard to tell since neither of them has ever had a friend before. It also takes on a job as a security consultant for a group of humans and slowly starts to learn that not all humans are as cruel as the ones it has always worked with. ART is a great addition, and I really hope it shows up in future stories.