Rated The Song from Somewhere Else 8/10
Beautiful story (and printed paper was so nice).
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Rated The Afterlife of Walter Augustus 4/10
A bit obvious, uneventful and a miss for me.<br/><i></i><br/>As always this review is based on my experience of reading this book and not reflective of the actual content or story for a broader audience (I say because I'm not particularly glowing in my rating!).<br/><br/>If I had this on holiday then I may have warmed to it a little more. It definitely feels like the kind of book that doesn't require much thinking.<br/><br/>I found the twist "baddie" very obvious but at the same time lots of the story moved forwards without any real reason.<br/><br/>I came away from reading the book like it had been 100 pages or so. Maybe it's because I felt like the characters didn't have any depth - the sister Victoria is cruel and unkind to the protagonist Letty, but it seems for no reason other than to make a bad character (in the living world). <br/><br/>Then there's Walter, living in the afterlife (or the interim, or maybe even purgatory…), it's unclear why he's been there for so long - what was special about his name. He wrote a book of poem, god knows how many hundreds of years prior to the current day, so I'm not entirely sure why he doesn't pass on.<br/><br/>Later we meet Hector. I'm not sure how he's part of Walters "life". Maybe it was explained and I skimmed idly past it, or perhaps it's just some rando that has a larger part to play - and even then, when Hector plays his hand, he kind of just falls off the pages.<br/><br/>All in all, a bit of a miss for me.
Rated Close to Home 8/10
Solid reading, what I've come to expect from Hunter.<br/><i></i><br/>Having now read three of the Adam Fawley books, albeit in reverse order, I've come to expect a certain level of story telling from Cara Hunter and this as the first book does not disappoint.<br/><br/>Having recently read the 2nd book (though the order isn't crucial) the twist device was a little familiar but it didn't distract from the story, nor did I predict any part of the story.<br/><br/>Enjoyable as a British based modern investigation story that leans more on (what I imagine is) police work rather than glamorous whodunit style reveals.<br/><br/>Looking forward to reading the fourth installment.
Wants to read The ZX Spectrum Ula: How to Design a Microcomputer
Wants to read Why I'm No Longer Talking to White People About Race
Rated Lord of the Flies 6/10
Stressful, but solid, reading.<br/><i></i><br/>My rating is based on how much I _personally enjoyed_ the story. It was pretty heavy reading, and perhaps more so as I knew there was an underlying bullying aspect that ran through the story - and bullying always puts me on edge.<br/><br/>The book itself is brilliantly written and the climax of the story is masterfully executed. Golding does an excellent job of slowly building up the tension throughout the story until it's crashing so hard at the end of the story it seems like there's no way out.<br/><br/>Ralph's (one of the protagonists) feeling of peril at the end of the book is visceral. Reminding me of my typical nightmares and stress dreams where I'm unable to escape the terror no matter what choice I make.
Rated Adrian Mole: The Prostrate Years 6/10
I had a hard time reading this book, took me a long time as I found Mole and the surrounding characters extremely…sad or pathetic or selfish. It continued on like this until about 80% where I started to enjoy the book a little more and the characters finally start to bloom and become more complex, and endearing. <br/><br/>It ends on a hopeful note, and after realising this was the last Mole story that Sue Townsend wrote before passing away, leaves me a little sad that this life sort of vanishes with her. I had read The Secret Diary when I was a teenager back in the 80s so Mole has always existed for me, almost like a character from a reality show. <br/><br/>So even though I struggled with this book, I'm glad to have read Mole's final chapters, and hope that he's happy somewhere in his literary universe.
Rated Exit Strategy 10/10
I read the first installment of the Murderbot a few months back (as an Amazon single), but after reading it, I decided I was going to pony up the £8 for the following 3 books - although probably the most I've spent on a single book, let alone 3 books - absolutely totally worth it. I **loved** this series.<br/><br/>The series follows Murderbot, a rouge security unit, mostly good at killing but who would rather just watch TV and be left alone. The first book reads easily as a stand alone, and I'd say the second book does too. <br/><br/>The third and fourth pull together all the previous adventures into an overarching story that we see Murderbot learning about itself and struggling with the the concepts of emotions and desires.<br/><br/>In fact, the Murderbot ends with that huge question of: what do you want.<br/><br/>There's so many things I enjoyed about this series: it's a sci-fi that doesn't really require you to understand all the ins and outs of the political systems that exist in the world. I've read a few sci-fi books that really struggle to make the world believable because there's often so much to take in - the Murderbot diaries does this in a way that reads easily and lightly.<br/><br/>The action sequences are really well written and fairly easy to follow - another thing I've struggled with in other books.<br/><br/>Even though we know that the Murderbot is a construct, it exists in a time that emotions can be simulated - and therefore felt - by the Murderbot, which, just like any one of us, they don't relish having to process those emotions, and they'd much rather just shun away and hide away escaping with TV.<br/><br/>Finally the characters are refreshing. As a white man myself, I'm too quick to assume the gender and race of the characters I reading about, Martha Wells does a really good job of keeping me in check, reminding me that Murderbot _doesn't_ have a gender, there's people in the universe that don't identify as one gender, and that not everyone is white. I love this, and I appreciate it in the books I read (in the hope that it shifts my mindset).<br/><br/>Loved it.
Rated Stories of Your Life and Others 10/10
I absolutely loved this collection of stories. Inspiring, beautiful, not-so-sci-fi that it was disconnected from our world. <br/><br/>What I also loved about these stories is that they made me think about my own world and and I wanted to share these conversations and thoughts with those around me.<br/><br/>I _think_ my favourite story was 'Story of Your Life' (made in to the film The Arrival) closely followed by 'Tower of Babylon'. But even the _short short_, 'The Evolution of Human Science' was superb, right down to the very first opening paragraph!
Rated Wishful Drinking 6/10
Very easy and quick read (for me). The writing is extremely conversational (which makes for a nice change). <br/><br/>It does occasionally feels a bit here and there, rather than centred, but I kept reminding myself that the book started as a one woman stand up, so it's understandable. <br/><br/>None the less, the book is littered with (genuinely) laugh out loud moments (took me a good few minutes to stop laughing at the hearing-aid anecdote), and beautiful insights as well as kind words for those (of us) with mental illness.
Rated The Dead Fathers Club 6/10
The story of an 11 year old boy after his father dies. The story uses a unique story telling device where it's told from the boys mind (or imagined diary), but the result is a stream of consciousness, littered with rule-breaking authoring techniques. <br/><br/>I can imagine this method coming off as forced or trite. But Haig's book manages to execute really well.<br/><br/>There's some vivid scenes of loss that touch my own personal childhood, remembering my own mother in the early chapters. <br/><br/>The boy himself believes he's being visited by his deceased father who asks him to enact revenge for his recent death. <br/><br/>The boy, Philip, struggles with his own confused feelings of being a boy, being 11 and starting to see more of the world, and being thrown into a new family structure. It's all too much for him.<br/><br/>Being inside his head you can understand his actions, and it makes me wonder about how we judge someone from the outside who behaves so oddly or "badly".<br/><br/>Ultimately we're left to decide for ourselves whether the boy is really seeing ghosts, though one thing is clear by the end: he'll need counselling to get through the next 15 years.<br/><br/>A good, fast, little read, perfect for holiday reading.
Rated The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl, Vol. 1: Squirrel Power 8/10
Nice alternative to the super heroes I've read in the past. A very strong young woman (that I'd want to share with my kids), and surprisingly doesn't kick butts as often as she alludes to, but uses sensible discussion and compassion to bypass her foes.
Wants to read Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind
Rated The Lamp of the Wicked 10/10
Edited 18d ago
Finished reading A Practical Guide to Evil IV
Edited 77d ago
Rated The Power 10/10
Loved this book. For me, it puts a magnifying glass on the grotesque behaviours that men have and still do, inflict on women, simply because of gender, this warped idea that one is stronger than the other. As a man this book is a huge insight into the reality of the power struggle, along with being a great page turner and great thriller.
Rated The Name of the Wind 10/10
Absolutely superb stuff. This book was recommended separately by three different friends, and it lived up to expectations. <br/><i></i><br/>It's the first fantasy book I've read (or certainly in the last decade) so initially I wasn't quite sure. As the chapters progressed though, the story fell into really beautiful story telling.<br/><br/>I'm was taken away by how good the writing and prose were. There were turns of phases that were fun and a pleasure to read. The book itself is also broken into small enough chapters that I could read for 15-20 minutes at night and complete a chapter (I like to stop reading at "natural" endings).<br/><br/>The story, or rather the trilogy of books (this being book 1), follows Kvothe and the telling of his life story. Kvothe agrees to tell his story over three days (at which point I realised that I was reading Day 1). <br/><br/>I'd to write more of thorough review, but the story is brilliantly dense that I can't do it justice. The second book in the trilogy is 1,000 pages - which is daunting to me, but it's definitely on my reading list now. There's also a number of novellas that have been written for the world the Rothfuss has written which I've also earmarked. As for the conclusion of the trilogy, I've been told that not only is there no publication date set, but that Rothfuss has been at it for 8 years 😱!!!