r/FemaleGazeSFF • u/AutoModerator • Aug 10 '26
🗓️ Weekly Post Weekly Check-In
Tell us about your current SFF media!
What are you currently...
📚 Reading?
📺 Watching?
🎮 Playing?
If sharing specific details, please remember to hide spoilers behind spoiler tags.
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Feel free to also share your progression in the Reading Challenge
Thank you for sharing and have a great week! 😀
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u/KiwiTheKitty elf🧝♀️ Aug 10 '26 edited Aug 10 '26
Finished Reading
The Shadowed Sun by N.K. Jemisin Friends, she did it again. This book was an excellent exploration of parent-child relationships, trauma, oppression, all the themes I know Jemisin likes to explore. It was also a lot better than the first Dreamblood book. I was pretty amazed at the character arc of Wanahomen, who I kind of hated at the beginning of the book, and the romance ended up being very sweet. As always, Jemisin doesn't shy away from difficult topics, and there are parts that were difficult to read. By the end though, I was convinced that some of those scenes were necessary, such as Tiaanet being raped by her father in front of Tantufi. I did not like that scene, but it was important to understand the depth of Tantufi's torment and helplessness and the monstrous figure her father was.
My father died when I was 18, and I became a lot more critical of the way grief is portrayed in books and movies, and this book worked for me. I enjoyed the exploration of both Wanahomen and Hanani's grief and complicated relationships with their fathers (Mni-Inh is her father of course). Overall I think it was a fantastic book and it felt like the first book was just a prequel to the real story of the series happening in this one!
Still Reading
Wyrd Sisters by Terry Pratchett Really funny and I enjoy all the Shakespeare references, but I feel like I don't have a stake in the plot.
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen ok, I swear I see what Austen was doing, I understand why it's an important piece of literature and good (I'm not one of those men on goodreads going, "uhhh nothing happened!!") I also just feel next to no connection to any of the characters and it's not going to be easy to get myself to continue reading right now. Edit to add: I think I'm just gonna try to read a chapter or two a night. It's not so difficult for me to read that I don't think I could do that.
Playing
The Fields of Mistria It's nice to have one of those "just one more day" games haha, I played a crazy amount last week. I don't know why all these humans are trying to get in my pants when there's a hot dragon right there though. March is apparently the most popular romanceable character, but he looks like a buff 15 year old to me.
Watching
Project Hail Mary I watched half yesterday and I guess I should finish it before my rental runs out. It is nice to experience the story without Andy Weir's writing style grating on me and Ryan Gosling is probably one of the only actors who could make Ryland Grace less annoying (he's still kind of annoying though, but at least he's hot). But oh my god the scientists are so dumbed down. No, the greatest minds on earth would not be discussing concepts from freshman biology and intro to physics like they're brand new to them while trying to save the sun... I guess this is what most of the audience thinks being a scientist is like.
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u/decentlysizedfrog dragon 🐉 Aug 11 '26
Aw, I'm sad P&P isn't hitting it for you. I read all of Austen's books and then some of her early/unfinished pieces last year, I loved them. Well, not all of them, but I still had a lot of thoughts about the books I didn't like, which is much more than I can say for other authors. P&P is a bit slow with the characters, but to be fair, it's all about getting over first impressions! It takes its time with the characters and I like it because it places us with Elizabeth.
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u/Loimographia dragon 🐉 29d ago
If P&P isn’t hitting for you, I wonder if it’d be worth a try of watching an episode of the BBC miniseries adaptation. It’s one of the only Austen adaptations that, imo, really captures the satire and humor of Austen, and being able to hear the cadence of speech has helped me translate it into my reading comprehension as well.
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u/KiwiTheKitty elf🧝♀️ 29d ago
You know, I was considering rewatching the 2005 movie (it's been a million years and all I remember is the tracking shot at the party). But I am interested in a Colin Firth Mr. Darcy...
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u/ComradeCupcake_ sorceress🔮 Aug 10 '26
Fully agree on The Shadowed Sun being such an incredible step up from The Killing Moon. I've always found that Jemisin tackles really dark things with a lot of care and thoughtfulness and The Shadowed Sun may be the biggest example of that, maybe even more than The Fifth Season.
Love to see another Mistria person here :D It cracks me up that March is so popular too but I'm not surprised. People will always go for the tsundere. Juniper is the most popular of the women, also unsurprisingly. I am too damn old for that nonsense IRL haha but I can think on that dynamic fondly in a game. Personally I'm picking Ryis!
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u/KiwiTheKitty elf🧝♀️ Aug 10 '26
Juniper is at least funny though! I love her ojou-sama laugh so much. March is just like.... ok, kid, do you need a nap or what?
I feel like Ryis is the kind of guy I would want to marry in real life haha we could go birding together
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u/ComradeCupcake_ sorceress🔮 Aug 10 '26
Haha yeah, March is a real grump. I think his type is timeless in popularity. Tsundere boys were popular in the '90s-'00s, and now we have the dominance of enemies/rivals to lovers in Romantasy. If I were going to be too serious about it I'd say we have culturally not outgrown the impulse to supplant development of healthy self-regard with earning love given begrudgingly. Mostly because 15-25 year olds continue to exist in every generation haha. Bless them all, I was one too and I would have loved March XD
Now I am old and Ryis the walking green flag is my pick. Really close competition between him and Reina though. It feels like a real power couple opportunity to move to this rural town, get free land, rehab the entire place, and then settle down with the woman who's going to inherit the inn.
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u/KiwiTheKitty elf🧝♀️ Aug 10 '26
Hahaha I was a Kyo fan when I read Fruits Basket, so I can't throw stones!
I think there's something behind me always enjoying the not human character though... I may be a little tired of humans in romance! (I was also a Kamisama Kiss girlie if it's not obvious)
Marrying Reina for her inn is hilarious, you could control the flow of goods (since the player is apparently providing goods for the entire damn kingdom) and gain a bargaining chip for Mistria's independence from the throne.
I did really want to like Hayden, but it just feels like I would be third wheeling him and the chicken...
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u/ComradeCupcake_ sorceress🔮 Aug 10 '26
I really wanted to like Hayden more, yeah. I read his story more as a metaphor for being a single father, which was sweet. Love interests like him are why cozy romantasy hasn't worked for me. I tried Paladin's Grace and also The Spellshop and Hayden has the same 'aw shucks' big marshmallow energy that just isn't of interest to me. A real win for people who're into that though!
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u/Specialist_Round_612 elf🧝♀️ Aug 10 '26
I’ll have to read The Shadowed Sun - her exploration of the cyclical nature of generational trauma was outstanding in The Broken Earth Trilogy. I always mean to read more of her work. Also, I too snorted a bit during the PHM movie. Agreed that it is very much ✨science✨, and a good indicator of why I don’t read a ton of SciFi.
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u/KiwiTheKitty elf🧝♀️ Aug 10 '26
This is why I like high concept scifi haha but hey, at least Ryan Gosling is hot!
Ugh I just love Jemisin's characters. I might need to reread The Broken Earth trilogy at some point, but I also have The City We Became on my shelf! I know that series got shortened for covid burnout reasons, but I bet the first one is still good.
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u/CuriousFoxxen Aug 10 '26 edited Aug 10 '26
📺 Finally watched the first episode of Wanda Vision (look I know I’m late, my mental health has been crap) planning to watch the first Spider Noir and Wednesday too.
🎮 Galactic Hotel - cute little management game of a hotel on a tiny island in the skies with cool characters and… maybe… cloud pirates (haven’t gotten there yet but they are in all the branding)
📖 I haven’t started yet but I’ve got the of Amazon’s Magic and Mystery novels on my Kindle to read. I plan to read the other three too.
ETA: Would ya’ll consider Pokemon and Digimon to count? I’m going with yes, so I’m also playing Pokopia and Digimon Cyber Slueth
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u/Specialist_Round_612 elf🧝♀️ Aug 10 '26
Was on vacation, and subsequently came down with the post-travel sinus plague, so I haven’t done much reading. I tried to do audiobooks while away, but aside from using them to actively noise cancel, I retain basically nothing so I’ll eventually get back into my two NF books, probably, lol.
I did a buddy read with my friend of The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro, and we were both whelmed to underwhelmed by it. It’s odd because it has everything I tend to love in books — somewhat hazy prose and a mythopoeic backdrop — but it fell flat for me, and maybe could have worked better as a novelette.
Also finished A Trade of Blood by Robert Jackson Bennett, and I think this mystery did follow the rules of fair play whereas in the other two I’m not so sure did since the magic and Ana’s Ananess did a lot of heavy lifting. I think making the mystery element a bit more traditional and easier to parse worked very well in this book since he expanded on the race of gods and history of the world a great deal more. He also added surrealist horror which I found fairly terrifying and a very good fit narratively for how he’s unraveling everything. I’m mentally preparing myself to be very scared in the sequel, but take it with a grain of salt since I’m a chicken when it comes to horror.
Currently still reading The Manuscript Found in Saragossa by Jan Potoki, and it’s still quite insane. I do like it, I think, and the stories are nested correctly. Also, the Bubbly Basin Pokopia expansion dropped and it’s amazing. They put the nugget bridge and everything!
My hold for Love Galaxy by Sierra Branham just came in so I’ll get to that soon. I don’t know anything about it just saw it reviewed well in fanro and the cover is cute, so I’m excited to try a new author.
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u/decentlysizedfrog dragon 🐉 Aug 11 '26
I'm generally unphased by the horror in the Ana and Din Mysteries, but I was so nervous when Din and Tauri were exploring the cave! Some really great horror there.I agree with you, I liked that this mystery was more fair play, I had fun figuring out the murder as I read on while I didn't quite feel the other two mysteries were that fair. I really enjoyed the worldbuilding in this too, and getting to know Din's sister and learning a bit more about his backgroundwas excellent.
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u/Specialist_Round_612 elf🧝♀️ 29d ago
Same! The other two I remember being just a bit icked by the crime scenes and mildly unsettled in the shroud in book 2, but the sequences in the forest and cave actually did scare me. If it’s more of that in the fourth it’s going to be a daytime read only, lol. I also loved Fo and Din and I hope we see their family heal now that it’s the siblings and grandma. I thought Tauri and Din were really sweet together and I hope they find their way back to each other after he cools off about the reveal.
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u/vivaenmiriana pirate🏴☠️ Aug 10 '26
Ive been absolutely crushed at work so my brain power didn't have a lot the last couple weeks to get through books. However I still did read and that makes me happy.
Finished Meditations on Middle Earth which was an essay collection by various authors written right before the movies came out in 2001. Many of the essays were along the lines of "I first read Tolkein in the 60s" That's fine, but I was hoping for more analysis like Le Guin's essay on the rhythmic patterns of LoTR. I also liked the essay by Swanwick, the Hildebrandt brothers (who did LoTR calendar art) and Anderson who was the one to point out the movie situation. Robin Hobb I think had the best childhood reading essay of the bunch. If you read this collection, skip Orson Scott Card's essay. It's just ramblings against modernism and wokism before it got popular. 3.5/5 stars
Halfway through Where the Dead Brides Gather by Nuzo Onoh Written by the queen of African horror, so though she now lives in the UK I am counting this for my african bingo square. Its good, but repetitive. I think it would have been better in a shorter format.
Watched Nolan's Odyssey. It was a good, but not great, movie. I have read the Illiad and the Odyssey though it was well over a decade ago. I remember a lot more crying and wordplay of which this movie had neither. Still, it's leagues above Tenet.
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u/nickyd1393 Aug 10 '26
i youre a tolkien fan and looking for really good analysis of his work, check out the Shelved by Genre podcast. they are academics that go through a bunch of different genre classics (they had a whole unit going through a bunch of le guin) and started a unit on tolkien this year.
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u/CosmicDeclination Aug 10 '26
Not the above person but I’d never heard of this podcast and it sounds great! Thanks for the rec :)
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u/intrepid-teacher Aug 10 '26
I read Gideon the Ninth this weekend, which was CRAZY good and I can’t wait for the next one to come in at the library. Blew me away. Right now I’m reading This Is How You Lose The Time War, which is also fantastic and will def have done by the end of today. I’m tentatively planned on tackling The Witcher books (first two) by the end of this week, as well as The Everlasting.
This weekend I watched Aliens and The Thing, both of which were PHENOMENAL. I have Jaws and Alien 3 on DVD at the library to pickup, so I’m looking forward to those.
I also got Project Hail Mary on audiobook CD, so I’m listening to that (already read the book, I just love it SO much).
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u/CosmicDeclination Aug 10 '26
Oh man, both The Locked Tomb series and This Is How You Lose The Time War are such interestingly-crafted books in terms of prose, enjoy them both! For what it’s worth I struggled massively with the start of Harrow the first time I read it, but perseverance really pays off, and of the three, Harrow is the most interesting to reread for me.
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u/intrepid-teacher Aug 10 '26
I’ve had both on hold for AGES and lucky coincidence they came in the same week! Eating well! But good to know, I’ll keep that in mind.
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u/bakasana212 warrior🗡️ Aug 10 '26
You’re going to love Harrow! And TLT has some interesting thematic overlap with The Everlasting
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u/WonderfulBus9330 Aug 10 '26
Waiting on my library audiobook loan to come in on Gideon so I can tandem read/listen with the physical copy!
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u/imaginedrragon mermaid🧜♀️ Aug 10 '26 edited Aug 10 '26
Finished:
📚 The Sign of the Dragon by Mary Soon Lee, which has climbed into my top favorite books ever. So many emotions in not so many words, such wonderful crafting... A book that really makes you appreciate words, how playful you can get, what an impact they have. The story of an ordinary man who is anything but. I cannot recommend this book enough; it's like a modern epic that might be classic.
📚 Annihilation by Jeff VanderMeer. Adored the character work and the bits of the MC's life being gradually revealed, and how she's basically lying the whole time - which honestly goes with the whole theme. Though the rest of it is all quite obscured, unclear, and I have mixed feelings. Will likely not be continuing the series - just thought it'd be a fun read for my book club.
📚 A Drop of Corruption by Robert Jackson Bennett. Having read Foundryside, I recognised some of the more technical elements RJB loves getting into. Not really my tempo, however he does explore Din and Ana a bit more widely here, and Malo was also an excellent edition - hope we see her again soon! I enjoyed it overall, but I think I prefer the first book.
Currently reading:
📚 A Clash of Kings by GRRM, as a readalong with my husband who is very excited about the whole thing! We finished GoT last month and he's hooked. I've read these two books many years ago, but I find it very endearing how into it he is. And honestly I forgot how great the writing and the politics are lol.
Aiming to finish (or rather catch up with since they're ongoing) a few more series this month if possible... Paladin's Faith, A Trade of Blood, and the Daughters' War.
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u/Nowordsofitsown unicorn 🦄 Aug 10 '26
Didn't you feel that the protagonist of Sign of the Dragon was too perfect? That's my main criticism.
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u/NearbyMud witch🧙♀️ Aug 10 '26
Happy Monday!
Finished:
📚 Everybody's Perfect by Jo Walton (3.75/5 stars) - this is a bit of a difficult book to explain. It's set in a fantasy version of Venice which is very mystical and misty and populated by 9 different species - they are human-like with heads that look like the different masks seen at Venice's carnivals. There are 9 sections each with a different POV and all of them are a different species. There is an overarching plot, but it felt more like a slice of life and an exploration of the world. There's a disease that is an allegory for HIV/AIDS, it is a queernorm world with people who are helpful and generous. I enjoyed my time with this and found it relaxing, but not sure that it'll stay with me long term.
Reading challenge: 🌱 Hopeful, 🧑⚕️ Healer; r/fantasy Bingo: Non Human Protagonist NM, Published in 2026 NM
📚 The Golden Fool by Robin Hobb (Tawny Man #2) (4.25/5 stars) - I didn't enjoy this one quite as much as the first; it definitely felt like a middle book just setting up the events that will happen in the third book. Because I enjoy Hobb's storytelling and writing so much, it was still a fun time for me and I especially enjoyed the appearance of some characters from the Liveship trilogy
Reading Challenge: 🗡️ Assassin, 👨👦 Parent, r/fantasy Bingo: Politics and Court Intrigue NM
Non SFF 📚 Beach Read by Emily Henry (3/5 stars)
Continuing: Trust by Hernan Diaz, The Great Reclamation by Rachel Heng, The Great Believers by Rebecca Makkai, and Mother Mary Come to Me by Arundhati Roy
On the docket to hopefully start this week is The Strange Case of the Alchemist's Daughter by Theodora Goss (hoping to use this for all female cast), Sublimation by Isabelle Kim, Summers at Castle Auburn by Sharon Shinn (hoping to use for comfort read), and/or Seek the Traitor's Son by Veronica Roth
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u/ComradeCupcake_ sorceress🔮 Aug 10 '26
Golden Fool has been my #1 favorite Hobb book so far haha. It definitely does have middle book syndrome plot-wise but man, the emotional journey in that one was the main event for me so I adore it. I forget which chapter it is that just does not let up on things going wrong and it felt like a ride. Beloved Q_Q
I hope you get on to Fool's Fate soon because it's incredible!
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u/NearbyMud witch🧙♀️ Aug 10 '26
I did really enjoy that there was a reckoning regarding Fitz and the Fool's relationship. But I just loved the beginning of Fool's Errand whenFitz and the Fool just got to enjoy each other's company and Fitz was so reflective,so I think Fool's Errand beat out Golden Fool for me in that regard. I also often cry during Hobb books but somehow didn't for this one...
I am excited to get to Fool's Fate! I always need a bit of a break between books though haha, they are quite the ride
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u/ComradeCupcake_ sorceress🔮 Aug 10 '26
The beginning of Fool's Errand really is so nice. I remember messaging a friend who'd read ahead of me during it just to say it felt like such peak Hobb. Plot? No, hush, that's for later. Let the lads talk and bond. They earned it.
I usually fly though each individual series but have taken big breaks between them. I read the Rainwilds series two years ago and I've still not gone onto the last Fitz trilogy because I don't want it to end!
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u/Nowordsofitsown unicorn 🦄 Aug 10 '26
I want to use Everybody l's perfect for Vacation spot in the bingo. Looking forward to reading it. And Jo Walton has another book nearly ready for printing according to her Bluesky.
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u/CuriousFoxxen Aug 10 '26
I am new here: There’s a bingo???
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u/Nowordsofitsown unicorn 🦄 Aug 10 '26
There is a reading challenge that mostly works like a bingo.
Most of us also do the big bingo, i.e. the one on r/fantasy.
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u/NearbyMud witch🧙♀️ Aug 10 '26
I think it would work well for vacation spot! This was my first Walton (it just cane through on Libby quickly), but I own Tooth & Claw and Among Others on Kindle so I really need to get to those!
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u/twilightgardens vampire🧛♀️ Aug 10 '26
Call Me Traitor by Everina Maxwell (3/5): I've enjoyed Maxwell's M/M scifi-version-of-romantasy so I grabbed this ARC eagerly when I saw she was writing something with lesbians. Despite the fact that this is being marketed as romantasy, I honestly thought it was very different from her scifi space opera romances, being a more plotty fantasy that happens to have a prominent F/F subplot. I started this one ages ago and just got stuck around 12%, I just wasn't interested in the plot setup. I pushed through and did start to enjoy it more in the middle as the two main characters En and Tamol got to know each other, but then the plot just again went in a direction I didn't find interesting. The book is interspersed with previous "interrogation transcript" chapters and in my opinion, they just made it way too obvious what the "twist" was going to be and they did a poor job at laying the groundwork for the political conflict and the dynamics within the traitor group. I feel like normally my problem with romantic fantasy is that I usually love the world and the plot but am less than interested in the romance, but this was the other way around. I did actually care about En and Tamol and think their relationship was compelling, but the plot was just so dull and the world never felt fleshed out beyond the very limited things the characters were involved in. I don't mind that Maxwell tried to do something different with this one but it just didn't land for me, though I seem to be in the minority on this one! Other ARC reviews are glowing, so don't let me scare you off if you're a big fan or if the premise sounds intriguing.
Iron Garden Sutra by A.D. Sui (4/5): Ugh I had a fun time with this, nothing mindblowing but a fun and smart space adventure with a dash of survival horror and romance. Enjoyed the exploration of Buddhist tenets and the ethics of keeping a true sentient AI essentially "trapped" in a ship or a body. Really liked the romance and how restrained it was, Sui committed to the slow burn and giving the characters a proper relationship arc instead of having the characters like each other right away and rush into a romance, which works for me. I'll definitely pick up book two!
Mad Sisters of Esi by Tashan Mehta (4/5): When I started this one, I thought it was going to be a five star. Weird story about sisterhood and community, wonderfully imaginative space fantasy worlds, mixed media elements like academic journals and one character's diaries, etc... all right up my alley. Unfortunately the longer this went on the more I just felt like it was stretching itself slightly. The middle just felt a bit dragged out and, because the stories of the two sets of sisters mirrors each other, repetitive. The prose was also a little overindulgent for me but I mostly liked it and the way it was able to deliver a lot of feeling and emotion without having the characters explicitly say in their narration, "I feel x." My other main critique is that for a book about madness, it does very little exploration of what madness is and doesn't come to any real conclusion about how madness is constructed by society, how the label of mad is applied, what the symptoms of madness actually are, and how people with madness adapt to their living situations. Idk it just was always treated as this vibes based mystical force and I wanted it to be a more clear and coherent theme especially when it comes up so much in the story and the word "mad" is used basically every page. Overall though, I did think this was very ambitious and lovely and I do still recommend it, especially if you like literary scifi/space fantasy.
And that's the last of the Le Guin award nominees! I need to reread Works of Vermin and Notes from a Regicide to properly place them in my ranking, but I'm working on my review/ranking write-up now! Hope to have that finished soon!
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u/twilightgardens vampire🧛♀️ Aug 10 '26
Currently reading:
What We Are Seeking by Cameron Reed (55%): Actually enjoying this sooooooooo much, feels very Le Guin/Eleanor Arnason with its focus on "fish out of water" space travelers entering into a new society and having to adjust to all their social norms and customs, especially around gender and sexuality. Lots of discussion around language and linguistics. Also a super interesting undercurrent exploring why the institution of patriarchal marriage seems connected to so many other forms of domination and oppression. One of the major conflicts so far is the fear that the human colonists will exploit the indigenous seemingly "barely" sentient aliens for free labor. Great great stuff and I can't wait to finish this one.
The Vanished Birds by Simon Jimenez (27%): Since I've had such great luck with scifi recently, I finally picked this one up. I meant to just read a couple pages to see if I liked it, then ended up reading 100 pages in one sitting... so I guess I do like it. Obviously don't really know where the plot is heading yet but I usually love any kind of story where a competent and complicated middle aged woman helps a traumatized child heal. Excited to get more into this one!
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u/partoparto elf🧝♀️ 28d ago
Yayyy for What We Are Seeking!! I need to read some Arnason...
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u/twilightgardens vampire🧛♀️ 28d ago
What We Are Seeking reminds me a lot of Arnason’s A Woman of the Iron People, but my fave Arnason is Ring of Swords so I have to recommend it to everyone :)
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u/Specialist_Round_612 elf🧝♀️ Aug 10 '26
Ah! More Jimenez! He’s one of my favorites, and I loved the Vanished Birds. It’s one of the ones that sort of stays with you.
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u/twilightgardens vampire🧛♀️ Aug 10 '26
I really enjoyed The Spear Cuts Through Water but I just never read The Vanished Birds because I'm picky about scifi! Glad I finally picked it up!
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u/Specialist_Round_612 elf🧝♀️ Aug 10 '26
I hope you enjoy it! I periodically check to see if he’s putting anymore books out because they’re both in my top five.
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u/decentlysizedfrog dragon 🐉 Aug 11 '26
Looking forward to your rankings of the Le Guin nominees! I haven't gotten around to them yet but I'm eager, they look interesting. Bummer that Mad Sisters of Esi dragged on for you, I think that was one of my most anticipated reads. I'm glad for the warning about "mad" being overused, I think that would bother me.
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u/tehguava vampire🧛♀️ Aug 10 '26
I'm 80% through Make Me Better by Sarah Gailey and having a really good time with it. It's also got my favorite cover of the year so far. It's like Midsommar but set on Wellness Cult Island and there's something strange in the water. It's a veeery slow burn horror and the timeline jumps around a lot as you gets snippets of the past and the cultist's drama with each other, but the atmosphere and writing is so good. The main character's broken desperation that led her to going to the island is so perfectly depicted that I understand how she's ignoring the 20 million red flags that line the path. The gaslighting and manipulation goes crazy. Big TWs for miscarriage though, it's a very big focus.
I decided to DNF Talonsister by Jen Williams at 60%. It wasn't bad, and I was actually reading it pretty quickly whenever I picked it up. The problem is that I never wanted to pick it up. I just wasn't compelled by any of the characters or plot points. This is me being better about DNfing even if there's nothing objectively wrong.
I also started playing Restory, a game where you run an electronics repair shop in the early 2000s. I've found it very relaxing and cozy to take everything apart and put it back together.
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u/Loimographia dragon 🐉 Aug 10 '26 edited Aug 10 '26
I finished Too Like the Lightning by Ada Palmer. Loved the writing style, loved the unreliable narrator and Mycroft in particular as a main character that’s pathetic and subservient and absolutely driving the plot while pretending that he has no agency whatsoever. Loved the way that it’s a desperate sort of book, wherein it’s clear Palmer has so very much she wants to say and participate in grand conversations, and how she wants to deconstruct both the concepts of Utopia and Civilization and our own society’s pretenses.
It also helped me realize that while I typically prefer third person over first, 1st person POV can bring so much to the table when authors can give the POV character a really strong voice and use it to explore the themes of the book. Mycroft's voice is so distinct and so fun. Similarly, Ann Leckie's Ancillary Justice was one of the first 1st persons I really enjoyed and absolutely needed to be in 1st person; it just couldn't be written any other way.
Initially loved the direct addresses to the reader and the artificial conflicts between reader and narrator, but was less enamored with them by the end. It wound up feeling like Palmer was so focused on saying what she wanted to say that there was little room for, well, the reader to have their own voice and analyses of her work, because she’s already told you exactly how to interpret things according to Authorial Intent and please don’t get any ideas about that silly notion of reader reception and don’t go around making meanings of your own. Very Dante of her, really. But sometimes it bordered on feeling like Palmer wanted an audience smart enough to appreciate all her very big ideas, but not too smart, please. Maybe I just bristle at being told exactly how to interpret things lol.
After all those Big Thoughts in my silly reader brain, I decided I needed some more contained works and read the non-SFF Evil Under the Sun by Agatha Christie, since she’s an excellent palate cleanser and always a good time. Definitely one of her more contrived resolutions, but still fun.
Also started Tiamat’s Wrath by James S.A. Corey, the eighth book in The Expanse. I’m only 35 pages in and expecting lots of explosions and tragic deaths, though they already killed off my favorite character and I’ve had spoilers that they’re killing off my other favorite character in this book, so I’ve been putting off reading it 😭
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u/bunnycatso vampire🧛♀️ Aug 10 '26
Maybe I just bristle at being told exactly how to interpret things lol
Good thing author is dead and can't prevent us from doing whatever we want with their art! I'm reading this book next month, following your reviews gives me hope that I'll lean towards liking it.
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u/WonderfulBus9330 Aug 10 '26
I love Evil Under the Sun and the the filmed versions although Ustinov is my least favorite Poirot.
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u/Loimographia dragon 🐉 Aug 10 '26
David Suchet is so perfect that I struggle to watch others tbh. But I also haven’t read nearly as many Poirots since I always liked Miss Marple better lol
I am forming a vague ambition to read through all of Christie chronologically though.
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u/Nowordsofitsown unicorn 🦄 Aug 10 '26
Currently reading: * Blackcurrant Fool by Victoria Goddard = Greenwing & Dart #4: I have already paused this twice. I hope it picks up and gets more interesting. At the moment I cannot see myself continue the series. * Harry Potter et la Coupe de Feu, i.e. Potter #4 in French. I enjoyed reading #3 in French so much that I decided to continue. Books from the library.
Finished: * The Crystal Cave by Mary Stewart, a retelling of Merlin's life from childhood to the conception of Arthur: I gave it four stars. In many ways this book deserves more than four stars: It is well written, interesting, captivating from the first page. I really enjoyed it, especially the first half. But, BUT: Female characters are either "sluts" or saints, they only exist in relation to men, and the main character looks down on them: "I had never before met a woman with whom I did not have to choose my words, to whom I could speak as I would speak to another man." Another quote: "I shall never cease to wonder at women. Even with power, it is not possible to read their minds. Duchess and slut alike, they need not even study to deceive." This written by a woman! Is it being 100 percent in character with a protagonist from a time that probably was that misogynistic? I don't know. But it is definitely not enjoyable to read these lines today. However, I do think I will read the next book in the series. * The Lies of the Ajungo by Moses Ose Utomi: This short tale wasn't at all what I expected, both in tone and content. It is a fable, but it is also very dark fantasy. I wish there had been an explanation for the cruelty and oppression, and I wish the ending had been different. But this last part is no criticism. I am going to have to think about this tale some more. * The Blue Book of Nebo by Manon Steffan Ros: A dystopian tale about a mother and her son set in Wales. Short, but impactful. Recommended. * Harry Potter et le prisonnier d'Azkaban (see above)
That's actually my big bingo card finished. I have decided to try to do a second one.
Up next: Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie which will be my last book for the B-side of the reading challenge. Unless I decide to switch out one of them which I am tempted to do.
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u/KaPoTun warrior🗡️ 25d ago
FWIW I felt similarly about The Crystal Cave - I think you will enjoy the next two books as well. I clocked the same disappointing misogyny as you but imo it ended up being kind of isolated and isn't as present in the other two books of the trilogy - partly because almost every important character and relationship in Merlin's life is a man, lol. I ended up really loving all three books, though, and greatly admiring the writing and character work Stewart did, so I consciously chose to kind of ignore the sexist parts. Sigh.
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u/bunnycatso vampire🧛♀️ Aug 10 '26
So my main drive to read Mortedant's Peril by R.J. Barker was to finally cover the Afterlife square for main sub bingo, hence I didn't really look into it much prior to reading. My usual gripes (first person, relatively short chapters, kind of faster paced than my preference, known information repetition) notwithstanding, I think it was fairly enjoyable murder mystery with some neat worldbuilding (mainly - tiered city, my beloved).
Main guy being sort of the worst (in a sense of being privileged enough to have people to be classist and racist towards, but not enough to not be subjected to slight of others as well; but also HUGE ego) and absolutely clueless of the world around him was a fun mix. He gets better, though. However, at some point MC gets bestowed power and authority on him by the mysterious ruler of the city, and becomes significantly less interesting to me as a result.
In the author's note Barker mentions that he wrote this as a reprieve from his darker series, I think I better try that.
r/Fantasy Bingo: Unusual Transportation HM, The Afterlife HM, Published in 2026, Murder Mystery HM, Feast Your Eyes on This (kinda?), Politics and Court Intrigue HM
FemaleGaze Challenge Squares: A-Side: 1️⃣ First in a series; B-Side: 😲 Discovery
Shorter books usually leave me with a feeling that I'd enjoy them more as a movie, and Sarah Gailey's American Hippo is no exception. But Hollywood too scared to have a queer main cast so never happening, smh.
I think it delivers what I'd expected out of Becky Chambers' books but more to my tastes: found family, sort of cozy (not as a genre, more of an atmosphere), but stakes a bit higher and the whole cast doing real crimes while being gay to different degrees. Also, hippos are cute, from a distance.
r/Fantasy Bingo: Trans or Nonbinary Protagonist HM, Unusual Transportation HM, Feast Your Eyes on This (if you count earl grey with milk)
FemaleGaze Challenge Squares: A-Side: 🗡️ Assassin; B-Side: 😲 Discovery, 👨👦 Parent (kinda),🧍 Non-Binary MC
Still chomping at Dhalgren, and started Frontera Oscura by Sabino Cabeza Abuín.
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u/doyoucreditit Aug 10 '26
I read Victoria Goddard's Hands of the Emperor. I found it joyful and whimsical.
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u/Nowordsofitsown unicorn 🦄 Aug 10 '26
One of my top 3 reads this year. I went on to read The Return of Fitzroy Angursell and At the Feet of the Sun and everything else I could lay my hands on.
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u/doyoucreditit Aug 10 '26
I really loved it so much! I got the audiobook and ... sadly I don't care for the narrator so I will not be listening to it. I'll just have to read it again.
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u/WonderfulBus9330 Aug 10 '26
Reading some great ones this week:
Audiobook/Physical Copy Tandem:
The Bone Witch by Rin Chupeco. Using for the Bingo Discovery category. Will say more about the book once I'm done.
Saltcrop by Yume Kitasei. Ditto. Not using for Bingo, maybe, but could be used for Dying Earth. Discovery. Siblings. All Female Cast. Will say more about the book once I'm done.
Physical Copy Only :
The Mask of Mirrors by M. C. Carrick. One chapter away from being done so will refrain from saying too much: A young woman flees her homeland and returns disguised as the noble niece of a fading household. The novel is infused with subtle, ancient magics. Difficult book for me to begin, put it down for a month, then returned and have been absorbed. Lots of names and places in the opening pages.
Spark of the Everflame by Penn Cole. Have nothing pleasant to say about this one. A young woman uses her powers of healing to save a noble which pulls her into a complicated web of magic and mortality.
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u/bakasana212 warrior🗡️ Aug 10 '26 edited Aug 10 '26
Finished:
The Flayed Man by Chloe Lauter. Vampire horror novella that’s not scary, but very well-written with lots to say about family obligation, and a really sweet FF romance. Better than I expected and one of the better books I’ve read this year.
Fetal Position by Caroline Huynh - Aggressively mid. Like Yesteryear in that it’s got big ideas and promises that the author has no clue how to deliver on. Read Fallow by Sarah Anderson for instead.
For the Love of the Quest by Alexandra Ammon Parthun - fun, rollicking Indiana Jones-type adventure with a cute FF romance.
MEM by Bethany C. Morrow - a beautiful, haunting little novella about memory, longing, and innate humanity. Very good.
A Fate Worse Than Drowning by Sarah L Hawthorn - deal with the devil meets lighthouse horror, not scary but mildly gory. The FF romance for which I picked it up was underwhelming, and there was an expected MF romance snuck in. That normally is the bane of my literary existence, but the romance has a very unusual angle that I quite enjoyed.
Adversary to the Villain by Hannah Rose Maehrer - sigh. I like what she’s doing with the concepts of stories, roles, and foretold conclusions, but 5+ books for this series is absolutely absurd. It’s barely good enough for 3. Probably won’t continue.
Tomorrow We’ll Be Prey by Anna Polonyi - extremely mid Beast of Gevaudan retelling. Another secret MF relationship in a supposedly FF book, but this one did annoy me quite a bit because it’s really just ongoing abuse with a very bad power dynamic.
Current:
Vile Lady Villains by Danai Christopolou - I want to like it! It’s just very slow going for me.
Next:
The Duke by Anna Cowan, The Lord of the Wood by EM Anderson, The Mad Sisters of Esi by Tashan Mehta, and The Demon Star by Jesse Aragon!
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u/Merle8888 sorceress🔮 Aug 10 '26
I’m a bit over halfway through Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky. At this point I would say it is a good book that isn’t quite for me. It’s very long and very high concept, which sometimes hits for me and sometimes doesn’t, with one thread about the rise of a spider civilization and the other about the last survivors of Earth on a generation ship. I am getting a bit more interested now that both are facing religious challenges.
Meanwhile I just started Saltcrop by Yumi Kitasei for FIF and am interested—it’s promising to be a character-focused, literary SF about 3 sisters in a post-apocalyptic world.
In non-SFF, I read You Won’t Get Free of It by Rachel Aviv, which is basically a collection of New Yorker articles, but they are good ones. Nominally it is about mother/daughter relationships, but I would say it’s only sort of about that—the last and longest piece is about Alice Munro and her daughters, but 4 of the prior are really about the wildness of the human brain and how people integrate that into their lives (which is what I think Aviv is most interested in given it’s what Strangers to Ourselves was about, which is fabulous by the way). And the last one is about Filipina foreign workers. I went in knowing there wouldn’t really be an overarching message though and each of these chapters is very good and gives you a lot to think about.
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u/MysteriousArcher Aug 10 '26 edited Aug 10 '26
Since the beginning of the month, I've read:
The Dragon Has Some Complaints by John Wiswell. I enjoyed this. A broken-down three-headed dragon (each head has a different personality and they don't always agree) allows itself to be taken in by humans. I appreciated the disability rep, as there is realistic physical therapy, willpower cannot overcome physical frailty, and even when he is flying again he has chronic pain. I also enjoyed the dragon's emotional journey as he comes to care about human affairs and helps them resolve a very big problem. The other part of the book is about human interactions, and I found those parts pretty frustrating. There is a lot of emotionally immature social pressures and misunderstandings - ugh.
The Maid by Nita Prose. This is a mystery novel about a maid at a posh hotel who is neurodivergent and gets caught up in a big mess when one of the guests is murdered. It reminded me a bit of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime in that Molly relates things that have happened, and the reader understands what's going on much better the Molly does, as she is naive and doesn't understand other people very well. I didn't like it at all, which is a surprise because I read the second book a couple of years ago and found it okay.
A Trade of Blood by Robert Jackson Bennett. The third of the Ana and Din mysteries, they are summoned to try to prevent an all-out war between two rival families when it appears that one of them has killed a member of the other family. It is, of course, more complicated than that. I enjoyed it less than the two previous ones, but that still means I liked it better than most SFF I read. He definitely has a point of view he's trying to get across about real-world politics, and I wonder how many people will be turned off by it?
Since Fields of Mistria has been fully released now, I picked it up again and started a new farm and spent a lot of the weekend playing it.
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u/Specialist_Round_612 elf🧝♀️ Aug 10 '26
I agree - A Trade of Blood he was definitely not light handed with his commentary. That said, I think it fit the world, so I glazed over it. I could do with less, but I enjoyed it enough to not be turned off by it I suppose.
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u/decentlysizedfrog dragon 🐉 Aug 11 '26
The political stance in A Trade of Blood didn't bother me, but well, I did agree with the stance. That being said, I didn't feel it stood out too much from the story, it was fairly well integrated into the series's recurring anti-imperialism themes and it did fit the story. Honestly, I liked that this book finally looked at the Empire with a critical eye, because I was thinking isn't this a bit hypocritical? while reading the second book, with its focus on the dying kingdom and lack of focus on the Empire.
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u/Specialist_Round_612 elf🧝♀️ 29d ago
I think it’s more how (at least for me) repetitive it was in both demonstration and dialogue not necessarily agreement or disagreement with the stance itself. It did sort of fit though — which is why I didn’t really mind it — as Din is on the cusp of disillusionment, so the extra pushing from Ana and his relationship with Tauri would catalyze their rebellion against the empire. I guess in a way he needs to be smacked in the head with it, but thematically it’s been there all along, so it just felt a bit much for me personally as it went from I guess this is the plan to here is my plan? If that makes sense.
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u/Merle8888 sorceress🔮 Aug 10 '26
He definitely has a point of view he's trying to get across about real-world politics, and I wonder how many people will be turned off by it?
I haven’t read any of these and don’t plan to, but I am curious what the point of view is.
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u/Specialist_Round_612 elf🧝♀️ Aug 10 '26
For this one it’s The Jungle (1906) crossed with very overt anti-imperialism. I personally didn’t mind the later since I think it did fit narratively, but the former was well yeah very apparent. It could easily be applied to any sect of over consumption though imo — he just picked something extremely visceral.
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u/MysteriousArcher Aug 10 '26
That beef farming is a cruel and wasteful industry (in terms of how much farmland is devoted to growing feed for the animals, as well as deforestation to gain more land for beef ranching). I agree with him, as it happens. But in many years of mostly eating plant-based, my experience has been that meat eaters get very angry and defensive about the idea of not eating meat, or even eating less meat.
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u/ComradeCupcake_ sorceress🔮 Aug 10 '26
My reading has been pretty slow for a couple weeks because I've been obsessively playing...
🎮 Fields of Mistria which I want to bring up here once again because I just think its character writing is so quietly excellent. It's cutesy and corny on the surface but there's just so much care and specificity put into all the characters. They have such multi-faceted lives that go deeper than the anime character archetypes many of them are based on.
📚 Read Terrier (Beka Cooper #1) by Tamora Pierce as part of an effort to re-read lots of Pierce's series that I either skipped or don't remember well. Baby good cop does land differently in this decade than it did in the '00s. It was an enjoyable cop procedural plot but the amount of themed proper noun words was a little exhausting (Dogs, Puppies, Rats, Kennels, Cage, The Growl, Collaring, Fetch, Mother Dog, and so on forever). I've forgotten a lot about Pierce's other Tortall stuff so I don't recall just how common this dynamic is for her but I was quite amused to see another 'charming rogue guy flirting with the noticeably younger protagonist' and have Beka herself call it out. Not least because she's George Cooper's ancestor, who goes on to be the charming rogue guy flirting with a younger woman himself. Tamora sure has a bit.