Books I’ve read 📚 log(book)

Imagine, if you will, Bram Stoker: a dour, somewhat dull man who always feels a bit out of place in the illustrious company of his fellow fantastical authors – like a clerk joining a circus. Do you really believe that this man came up with Dracula, of all things?

Clean Sweep

by Ilona Andrews · published 2013 · read 2021-03-13

Ilona Andrews, who I only knew from her Kate Daniels series, with the magical tavern/innkeeper trope. This is significantly worse than Kate Daniels – writing quality, plot quality, worldbuilding, characters: Everything. Apparently this series grew out of an online serial, which accounts for some of it.

War Music

by Christopher Logue · published 2015 · read 2021-03-12

War Music is art. Christopher Logue transformed the Iliad into a modern poem, and it's all kinds of awesome. The story is the real deal: Heroes of old, clad in bronze, fighting for a city and for honour and most of all for an honourable way back home. And yet, it's clearly written by somebody living in our age. Free-form poetry, modern comparisons – but all steeped in the awe of a gigantic, real, old story. I'm extremely into it. You might be too! This book might be more enjoyable when you can place all the names and comments (like "Dido might have become a grandmother / And Rome not had its day"), but it's still a lot of fun when you're just into the language and the story.

Turn the Ship Around!

by L. David Marquet · published 2012 · read 2021-03-11

Anarchic structures are great, particularly at groups under a certain size. I know this, my friends know this – I didn't expect a US submarine captain to know and advocate it. Yet that was the pleasant surprise I got.

Flight to Arras

by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry · published 1942 · read 2021-03-10

Published in 1942, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry talks about his life, experience, thoughts and feelings about being a pilot in WWII, while on the defensive and with little hope of surviving. The novella follows one flight, and comments on both the flight itself (mechanically, strategically) and the war in general.

The Empress of Salt and Fortune

by Nghi Vo · published 2020 · read 2021-02-26

High fantasy novella, vaguely Chinese-plus-Inuit (shush, it makes sense). After the Empress has died, a young monk – monks are enby in this world, which is neat – travels to her old castle, that has been off limits for decades. They explore the house and chronicle the stories of various things they find. It turns out to be vastly different than expected.

How You Stand, How You Move, How You Live

by Missy Vineyard · published 2007 · read 2021-02-25

Everything I knew about the Alexander Technique came from cultural osmosis and Michael Ashcroft's tweets. Now I know more: It's about taking care of your body (posture, harmful patterns, pain and age) by taking care of your thoughts. Mens sana in corpore sano only the other way round. Missy Vineyard has a lot of experience helping people fix their bodies, but also with their mental hangups and how these two influence each other. My biggest takeaway, apart from some very useful mental exercises, was an increased skepticism against what I feel I know about my body.

On Venus, Have We Got a Rabbi!

by William Tenn · published 1974 · read 2021-02-20

You know how I'm into space monks, aka scifi that has serious thoughts about religion? Yes, this is it. Hilariously tongue-in-cheek, there's nothing I did not like about this short story. It's written in 1974, and thankfully available online, both in text and as an even more hilarious reading by the author. The tone is everything. Space jews arguing about the inclusion of alien species. Let me just say “Papa, you’re so old-fashioned! You yourself told me that the blue Jews from Aldebaran show how adaptable our people are.” – if this doesn't sell you on the story, pass it by.

The Misplaced Legion

by Harry Turtledove · published 1987 · read 2021-02-16

★ ★ ☆ ☆ ☆ (did not finish)

When a Roman legion fights some Gauls, they are magically placed in a different world. This world has actual magic, has never heard from their world, and the society and politics closely resemble the Byzantian empire. Turtledove clearly knows his history, and makes sure to show how the legion adapts to the different world, the different language, the different gods. He handles that part well.

Sailing to Sarantium

by Guy Gavriel Kay · published 1998 · read 2021-02-10

Sailing to Sarantium was my first Guy Gavriel Kay book, and it won't be my last. Not just that it didn't wrap up in one book (boo! … kidding), I also enjoyed the style a lot. Kay lets his story take place in Byzantium during Constantine's reign. It's not called Byzantium to allow for some creative freedoms and minor magic, but everything very clearly maps 1:1 to historic characters.

Never Split the Difference

by Chris Voss · published 2016 · read 2021-02-08

Negotiations and bargaining explained by an FBI hostage negotiator – unsurprisingly a book where the show-off anecdotes are gripping. But beneath the standard self-help structure (bits of information sandwiched by ~~boasts~~ stories), there's a solid core: A general theory of negotiations, explained with plenty of examples. Bonus points for the clear chapter summaries.

This Census-Taker

by China Miéville · published 2016 · read 2021-02-02

Young child discovers the world – his occasionally psychopathic father, his practical but proud mother, and the little town at the foot of the mountain. Everything is both creepy and boring – a uniquely kafkaesque mix (and the end is straight up like a Kafka short story that I can point at).

Comes Around Again

by scarletjedi · published 2016 · read 2021-01-31

Sansukh-variation, with travelling back to the past to fix things. Not as well-written as Sansukh, but then again, what is? Decent and entertaining, but might have done more with the added knowledge – "some moments in time are fixed" is such a cope.

Sansûkh

by determamfidd · published 2017 · last read 2021-01-27

Sansûkh is an incredibly well-researched, detailed, well-written Lord of the Rings fanfiction, telling the whole story from the perspective of the dead dwarves keeping watch over their relatives. Its protagonist is Thorin Oakenshield, and in addition to all the plots told by the primary books, it also features Erebor and Mirkwood. The writing is very appropriate and well-done, and I enjoyed every part of it tremendously. It's funny, and it's epic, and it's very much as it should be.

The Lost City of Ithos

by John Bierce · published 2020 · read 2021-01-26

Currently the last part of the Mage Errant series, I was not all that much in love with this book. It's the set-up to drag the whole series out, in that Fantasy spiral of upping the stakes forever. Characters were still okay (though mostly carried by the work of the previous parts), but the plot turned very generic..

Probably Still the Chosen One

by Kelly Barnhill · published 2017 · last read 2021-01-24

Did you dream of being the hero of your own adventurous story as a kid? If you did, this will be good for you. Also, painful.

Mimus

by Lilli Thal · published 2003 · last read 2021-01-21

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Mimus is the wonderfully cruel tale of Prince Florin. In the struggle of two nations, the baddies use the age-old plot of suggesting peace-talks to come closer to their enemies. They capture the royal family and important court officials. Everybody is imprisoned, except Prince Florin, who is humiliatingly apprenticed to the court jester. That's the short setup. The book follows Florin in his reluctant apprenticeship to Mimus, through hardship, diplomacy, heartbreak and the realisation that life goes on.

Im Land des Windes

by Licia Troisi · published 2004 · last read 2021-01-18

Worldbuilding! I forgot about the worldbuilding of this book. For example, there are tower cities where everything is organised by the tower layers.

Die Panne

by Friedrich Dürrenmatt · published 1956 · read 2021-01-17

Our protagonist has a breakdown and, because the village inn is full, is invited to stay in a local mansion. It turns out that his host is a retired judge, and together with his friends, a retired prosecutor and a retired attorney, they stage a mock-trial of their guest – all in good fun – of crimes yet to be named. The rest is very Dürrenmatt. Short and enjoyable, but always with an edge of unease.

Grass for his Pillow

by Lian Hearn · published 2003 · last read 2021-01-17

Enjoyable second part of the series: Our heroes encounter adversity and have to make bad choices and live with their decisions. Less comfort read than the first part, different and good. The ending is extremely stupid and sets up the exceedingly stupid cause for the drama causing part three and four.

Across the Nightingale Floor

by Lian Hearn · published 2002 · last read 2021-01-16

Everybody is extremely dramatic in this book. Very YA. But it stood up to a re-read surprisingly well: Young boy in faux-Japan gets his family murdered, is adopted into a clan and things escalate from there. Oh, and it turns out he's not only adopted by the rightful leader of the clan, he's also born to a long line of secret assassins and has lots of magical gifts. And everybody wants a piece of them.

A Wild Ride Through the Night

by Walter Moers · published 2001 · last read 2021-01-13

Walter Moers decided to branch out and do something wildly different. Okay, maybe not wildly: there's still much absurdity going on. But it's not Zamonien. Instead, it's the story of Gustave Doré, the famous painter. Or rather, his paintings. Or rather, all of his paintings, shoved together into a rather trippy (but entertaining!) story.

Madita

by Astrid Lindgren · published 1960 · last read 2021-01-12

Madita is a somewhat less intense Pippi: she has a younger sister and is up to all sorts of ridiculous nonsense, but doesn't go to society-breaking extremes. Well, usually.

Just a Random Tuesday…

by Twisted Biscuit · published 2006 · read 2021-01-09

Delightfully snarky fanfic, in which we get a mostly canon-compliant inner monologue of McGonagall, mostly about Umbridge, ridiculous students and absurd colleagues. Good length, good general writing style, but lots of fluctuations in quality: Inner monologue good, storytelling mediocre, I think.

Schadenfreude

by Tiffany Watt Smith · published 2018 · read 2021-01-08

Schadenfreude ist die schönste Freude” – “Schadenfreude is the best joy” says a German proverb. If you're not on board with this, this book might make you look at the more positive sides of finding joy in other people's misfortune. Or it might bore you to tears with strained examples for Schadenfreude for chapter upon chapter. I know that “This book should have been a blog post” is tired and meh, but in this case I'd say: this book's afterword (which contains the good parts) would suffice as a blog post.

Naudsonce

by H. Beam Piper · published 1962 · read 2021-01-07

Naudsonce is a very neat linugistical scifi story. It's also terribly unimaginative in every other way: Aliens who communicate wildly differently, yet follow human norms in every other way? Puh-lease. Everything good done here was done better by Vernor Vinge.

Weaving Fate

by Aidan Wachter · read 2021-01-06

Weaving Fate is a woo book. The author believes in magic and assumes you do, too. I found this strangely refreshing, to be honest, and it made it easy to separate out the useful stuff, for my intents and purposes.

Annals of Arithmancy

by White Squirrel · read 2021-01-05

Last part of the trilogy. Not bad per se, but far from good. A collection of "look where I could take this" stories, loosely connected. No urgency or impact, really. Better than the original epilogue, but what isn't.

Lady Archimedes

by White Squirrel · published 2018 · read 2021-01-04

Second part of a Harry Potter fanfic. Better plot elements, maybe, but worse writing – started being a drag at some point. Still good execution on the theme of "what if science nerd, but Hermione" – several leagues more plausible and readable than HPMOR. I still like how it quotes extensively from pop and less-pop culture, and how it integrates then-current events.

The Arithmancer

by White Squirrel · published 2015 · read 2021-01-03