The Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal

3.5 Stars

Lady Astronaut - Book One

I started this book thinking I was about to read an alternate history about a group of women pioneering space flight on an alternate, historical planet Earth.  What I felt I just read was an autobiography of one of the first women in space.  An AU space, but still... not what I expected.

The story is told from the first person POV of Elma York, who is a mathematician and was a WASP pilot during the war.  World War 2.  She's also married to Nathaniel, who is an engineer and they are both Jewish.  (Although, for some reason - I suspect because of Hidden Figures - I kept thinking of her as black.)  Both of them are very, very smart.  The story begins in alternate 1952 and t the world isn't that much different from reality.

There is an awful lot of Elma becoming more and more aware of racial discrimination against people of colour while being subjected to antisemitism and prejudice against women personally. The latter half of the book is taken up with the beginnings of integration in the International Aerospace Coalition and Elma's learning to deal with her crippling - at times - anxiety as she moves closer to her goal of getting into space.

So, I was somewhat disappointed that I didn't get the story I expected to get when I picked up the book.  BUT, the book was a good read if I look at it as an AU auto-biography.  And because of that, I've added book 2 to the 'want to read' list. 

Behind Her Eyes by Sarah Pinborough

4 Stars

I think this book broke my brain.  *LOL*  I picked it up because it had been recommended to me by a very good friend.  It also had a lot of good buzz about it.

It's a differently structured book.  We get differing first person POVs and flashback scenes/chapters.  It's also written mostly in present tense, I think... At this point, there's so much of that being written that I seldom actually take notice of it.

At any rate, I was luckily able to avoid all the spoilers about the book, only knowing that there was one helluva twist to it.  And I would say that it's really, really important to do that.  I think the book would be pretty much ruined if you were spoiled.

I hemmed and hawed about my rating (between 3.5 and 4) because while I thoroughly enjoyed my read and was pretty much surprised about the main twist (I had suspicions as the end got nearer and nearer), the mechanics of constructing that twist felt just a wee bit deux ex machina to me?  But maybe that was my expectations?

And Netflix is making a limited series from the book, so I suggest you read it before watching. :)

Anyway... it was very good.  Read it.  Don't get spoiled.

Of Blood and Bone by Nora Roberts

4 Stars

Chronicles of the One - Book Two

The last of my six Christmas books.  It was a good year! 

This is the second of Nora's post-apocalyptic trilogy and it carries on the story of Year One, beginning thirteen years after those events.  We find out what has happened with many of our favourites from the first book and we get to meet The One - Fallon Swift - 13 year old daughter of Lana and Max, as well as catch up with Duncan and Tonia (Katie's twins and grandchildren of  the man who was basically 'patient zero' in the first book) who were just babies the last time we saw them. 

It's very much a book about the training of Fallon to take her place as the leader of her people.  We watch as she leaves her home and family to train with Mallick (a Merlin type character who I wish we'd seen more in depth) for two years.  She gains her powers and her mystical companions, the owl, the wolf and the alicorn.  We follow as she returns home and spends time with her parents and younger brothers on the family farm, readying them for the Big Battle to come.  We see her meet Duncan and Tonia and watch as they discover that they're meant to be this series' trio - Nora loves her trios of power.  And we journey with Fallon's family as they join up with the bunch from New Hope, the folks we followed and watched come together in the first book.

Along the way, there are some looks in on the New Hope settlement and a couple of quick meetings between Fallon and some of the folk.  There are a few battles and rescues.  And there are more than a few moments of discovering her powers. 

It's very much setting everything in place for the Big Battle to come in the third book and were it not for the engaging way Nora writes about her characters and the heart-touching moments of found family and shared histories that pepper the story, it would be a very boring book, I think.  It's very much a middle book. 

I enjoyed my read. As always with Nora books, I zipped merrily along, her writing style so easy to read.  There were moments of humour, moments of action and danger, moments of love and deep emotion and I will admit to being engrossed.  :)   I am very much looking forward to the culmination of the trilogy, due out at the end of the year. 

Red Sister by Mark Lawrence

4 Stars

Book of the Ancestor - Book 1

Christmas book #5, a new trilogy and a success!  I had read the Broken Empire Trilogy by Mark Lawrence a couple of years ago and disliked it intensely.  I found it very, very dark with no hope offered anywhere and a plethora of unlikable characters, so having Red Sister on my list was a chance I took only after seeing more than a few reviews stating it was not as dark as the others and after a few trusted authors recommended it.

So...

The book is the story of little Nona Grey and her arrival at the Convent of Sweet Mercy at the tender age of nine and continues for the next couple of years.  Yep, when the book finishes, she's barely eleven.  And while normally I would avoid a nearly 500 page book about a kid, I fell into the story so easily and so quickly it would make your head spin.  *LOL*  Nona is fascinating.  She reminds of the character of Laura in the movie Logan. In fact, I kept imagining the actress who played Laura in my head as I read about Nona.  Might have a bit to do with the claws. 

Nona goes through her training, makes friends and enemies and comes to a lot of realisations throughout the book, and her journey kept me turning the pages quite eagerly.  Quite the contrary of the the story of Jorg in that other trilogy.  Yeah, there is plenty of dark in Red Sister, but it never feels hopeless.  And the characters, all of whom have flaws, believable flaws, worked like a charm.  Lawrence even kills off one or two that I was very fond of, but that worked too.  Couldn't hate him for it. 

And the world-building!  Fascinating! 

So, yes, I was really glad I decided to give it a try and am anxious to get to the next book, Grey Sister. Oh, and the cover illustration is quite glorious. :) 

The Guns Above by Robyn Bennis

3 Stars

Signal Airship - Book One

So this was #4 of my Christmas books and while I did enjoy my read, I had been hoping for much more.  All the buzz on my social media was lauding the book to the skies as the best thing ever!  And so great to have a female main protagonist in a steampunk airship military fantasy book.  Well... yeah... okay... but it wasn't that great, folks. 

I liked it because the dialogue was witty, the characters fun and quite honestly, I'm a bit of an easy sell for a book about a tight group of soldiers/adventurers/scoundrels/whatevers fighting the odds, so to speak. 

Now, while I liked the characters, I sure would have liked more about them, what brought them to the point where they are in the story, what formed them, the whys of them, all that stuff.  Especially Josette, the female captain and Bernat - Bernie, the foppish spy/aristocrat/ne'er do well.  I loved their banter - I'm told it's rather Pratchett-esque, but having only read one Prachett book (aside from Good Omens), I can't say with any kind of certainty if that's right or not. 

There was a lot, an awful lot of battle narrative and even more description of the details of the airship. I mean... tons of details into all the nooks and crannies.  I would much rather have learned more about the characters and the society and the actual world of the story than all that minute stuff about the ship. 

So yeah, I don't get all the glowing blah-blah I read from people whose opinions I respect.  Just because the MC is a woman?  I mean, even that HUGE plot point is barely discussed or examined - far better we learn about fictitious airship mechanics.  I think we should be far past celebrations just because a woman leads a military/steampunk adventure fantasy.

So the book had great bones, but the meat of it was sadly lacking for me.  I'll check out the second book when it comes out, I'm sure, if only to see if there's more meat, so to speak. 

A Beautiful Blue Death by Charles Finch

3.5 Stars

Charles Lenox Mysteries - Book 1

This is the third book from my Christmas haul and again, I enjoyed my read. 

The book and the author were recommended by one of my most favourite authors, Louise Penny, the author of the Gamache series.  I just spent 20 minutes trying to find the reference and failed miserably  *LOL*.   Anyway, that's the reason I picked it up.

So, Charles Lenox is a Victorian gentleman who likes to solve mysteries. He has an interesting group of family and friends and he's a smart fellow.  I liked him.  I can see why Louise likes him as well - there's a faint Gamachian feel to the book and the characters which is fine by me. 

I like Finch's writing style, it's easy to read and while there are instances of what could be termed as info-dumping, they're handled well and not annoying.  He also does some easy back and forth banter between Lenox and his old friends that I found quite fun. 

The mystery worked for me, as did the wrapping up of the various plot-lines.  There was a question or two that didn't get answered, or if it did, I missed it, but that didn't impede my enjoyment of the book.

If I had one real problem with the book, it was that there was an awful lot of snowing going on in London for late December/early January.  I don't think it snows that much over there at all. 

Anyway, I enjoyed the book enough to add Book 2 to my wishlist.  :)

A Plague of Giants by Kevin Hearne

4 Stars

The Seven Kennings - Book One

The second read of my Christmas presents, this was a brick, but a fascinating one indeed. I'd read Kevin Hearne before, the first of his Iron Druid books, and quite enjoyed it. (I intend to continue on in that series when the budget allows it.)  This book is the first of an entirely new trilogy, set in a new world.  And I was fascinated.

The world-building is terrific.  Magic or kenning that actually takes a toll on the human body even to the point of death.  The majority of the peoples are shades of brown with the pale-skinned folk being the minority of civilizations and I think there's only one king among the bunch.  Hearne does a masterful job of getting across the atmosphere and the feel of the different 'countries' and while they mostly have a familiar feel, I never felt they were copies of other creations.

It's the characters that really sold the book for me.  The story is told almost in serial form by a bard by the name of Fintan, who takes on the appearances of different folk within the story as he tells the story, a little bit every day.  Usually two characters, maybe three.  In between these story-tellings, we get the POV of Dervan, the scribe who has been tasked with recording all the stories Fintan tells, as well as keeping an eye on him for his friend, the leader of the Brynt people.

We meet two handfuls of characters who tell the story of the initial invasions of the giants and through their telling of the story we're given the base of the bigger story to come, I'm guessing.  Lots and lots of set-up happening, but because the characters were so engaging - even the baddies - it was a pleasure to read. 

So, I really, really enjoyed it and am looking forward to Book 2 - especially the further adventures of Abhi and his bloodcat, Murr and his stalk hawk, Eep. 

Skies of Ash by Rachel Howzell Hall

4 Stars

Detective Elouise Norton - Book 2

The first of my Christmas presents didn't let me down.  I'm here to tell you that Elouise Norton, LAPD detective, is a breath of fresh air in police procedural/crime fiction.

Lou is smart, funny, sexy, intense as well as being a perfectly flawed individual.  Yes, sometimes her personal experiences and biases colour how she views a case and how she interacts with her co-workers, but she's so very real!  She has none of those endearing quirky flaws that many crime fiction leads have either.

Lou's current case begins with a house fire and three dead bodies and of course, there's far more than meets the eye.  As Lou and her partner, Colin, pursue the case, she also has to deal with her once-estranged but now back home husband, Greg.  And the remnants of the death by murder of her older sister years before (we saw the solving of that case play out in the previous book).

The twisty trail of the case kept me hooked through the book and while I had suspicions that changed as I went along, the culmination of everything was still pretty much of a surprise.  Not so surprising was the plot of Lou's marriage trials and tribulations, however there were a few bits that I wasn't expecting.  I do hope that in the next book we see more of Lou's friends, Lena and Sayeeta.  They're great characters and I love their interactions with Lou.  Girl power!  :)

I only have one complaint and I don't even know that it's valid, me being a white woman and all, but there MUST be some other way to describe POC skin than to liken it to some coffee or chocolate drink. (And in a book/series with a majority of POC characters, there is a lot of skin described!)

So my second foray into Lou Norton's world was a resounding success.  I loved it and have added Book 3 to my wishlist.

Twist of the Magi by Caren J. Werlinger

4 Stars

Another story perfect for the holidays.  The tale of Penny Havers was a fun read and altogether too short. And for once, an f/f romance that isn't filled with drama and angst over being lesbian!

Two thumbs up.

Tutus and Tinsel by Rhys Ford

4 Stars

Half Moon Bay 2.5

Great holiday read with much-loved characters. Rhys never disappoints.

Highly recommended!