lady_ragnell (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
lady_ragnell) wrote2025-10-03 11:36 pm
lady_ragnell) wrote2025-10-03 11:36 pm
2025 Books, Post 10
Up to 100 books at last! This group went at a decent speed, anyway, and maybe I can keep that momentum up. I'd really like to, anyway! This is quite a mixed group, and it includes two Oz books and my second sci fi novel in verse of the year.
The Facts and Fictions of Minna Pratt by Patricia MacLachlan
A reread of a childhood favorite, and truly this book has stood the test of time! It's sharp and funny and sweet and sad, it understands being a young music student and a kid figuring your life out, it teaches vocabulary words while being honest about that but also not boring about it, the ending is on my mental list of "I want to be able to end stories in ways that feel this satisfying and competent and perfect," it's just a triumph of a book and packs a whole lot of punch into its very short length. It's a pity I don't really know any 10-year-olds because I want to give it as a gift to someone but don't really know who I would give it to.
Green Grow the Rushes by Caitrín Casey
A little fantasy (for a given value thereof) romance. Also, weirdly, second book I've read recently that includes a proxy marriage as a plot point? Which I'm into, I love marriage tropes, let's have more of that. Anyway, never know how I feel about fantasy where there's not really any magic happening, it's just that the author clearly had a time-and-place vibe they were going for (Medieval Ireland, I'm fairly sure), but didn't want to get bogged down in the details of real people and real geography--I mean, I guess better this setting than making historians sad? Anyway, this was a slow, thoughtful book, didn't get me deeply, but was enjoyable.
French Leave by Sheri Cobb Smith
I was reading this expecting it to be more modern Regency romance vibes, but this is VERY much in the tradition of Heyer (I actually picked it up because I'd started a Heyer and realized it was a reread and decided it wasn't one I liked enough to reread, and the things they have in common, down to the heroine being 17 and the hero being 35, were baffling to me), and it didn't really do much for me. I was rather looking forward to engaging with the nun thing that's part of the premise more, but it was all very slight, and cared a lot about a misunderstanding subplot between the characters from a previous book in this series, so in general, not my thing.
Rinkitink in Oz by L. Frank Baum
My least favorite Oz book so far! Largely because it's barely an Oz book, Dorothy and Ozma only appear for a very short time towards the end, clearly Baum's annoyed concession to being able to market it as an Oz book. But also because Rinkitink is fat and oh boy does Baum find that an excuse for comedy. Just an exhausting read. If I weren't a completionist I doubt I'd have finished.
Aniara by Harry Martinson trans. Stephen Klass & Leif Sjöberg
There was a link to this in a Reactor article about a movie adaptation, and since I'd already read one sci fi novel in verse this year, I thought I'd give this one a try too! It was definitely a weird one, I'm still not sure what all to say about it, though goodness, Calypso had it all through its DNA, didn't it? A lot of interesting commonalities around what happens when people are on a fairly doomed voyage long-term across the vast expanse of space. Not entirely to my taste, really, but at the very least an interesting stretch.
A Pale Light in the Black by K.B. Wagers
Sci fi rather like if The Expanse did the Coast Guard, is the best way I can explain this. So, this book had a lot of things that were fun for me, with some found family and some interesting mystery and some competence, but it also missed out on a lot of the reason I was willing to give some somewhat military-bent sci fi a try, which is the rescues, since I'm so into rescue shows right now! There were a couple, but they were pretty glossed over and not a huge part of the book by volume. And a lot of the book by volume went to the preparation for and the hand-to-hand matches in some inter-branch military competitive games, but then a huge amount of the actual games themselves, including the winning moments, just got completely glossed over? I'm debating whether I'll read the next one or not.
Ink Blood Sister Scribe by Emma Törzs
Lent to me by my uncle. This took me a bit to get into, but I ended up really enjoying it! Fast-paced and interesting plot, interesting and rather brutal magic system, characters I could sympathize with, just generally a good way to spend a few days of reading time! I wish I had more to say about it? But I don't! It was a good book, I'd recommend it to--hmm, I think specifically if I knew anybody who wanted to give fantasy a try but spends more time reading general fiction and who I knew didn't mind violence and blood. The people who I would recommend Alix Harrow to if they generally prefer slower-paced reads.
The Lost Princess of Oz by L. Frank Baum
Conversely to the last Oz book I read, this one delighted me! Lots of the girls, which I enjoy (and there were at least three moments very early on where I went "wow, Mr. Baum, that does NOT read straight to a modern audience"), and a fun plot, even if after a while it stretches credulity that there should be so many entirely unknown corners of Oz. Also I can't profess to enjoy the continual lesson of "I mean, magic is cool, but only Ozma, Glinda, and the Wizard should be allowed to use it, anyone else might abuse it" that Baum was into, but whatever. I think I have four Oz books written by Baum to go? I'm not going to read those by other authors.
Surviving Our Catastrophes by Robert J. Lifton
A slim nonfic volume I read largely because I had a square on my book bingo card for reading something off the library's new nonfiction shelf. This is about Covid and climate change, but it's about them through the lens of Lifton's long career (he is, I believe, in his 90s--pardon me, was! He died at age 99 a month ago today, I just looked him up, I hadn't known before) as a psychologist doing work on the massive traumas of Hiroshima and the Holocaust. He glances off a lot of things, and I'm not sure how I feel about it overall (my mother, who also read it, was hit very hard by it, and baffled that I wasn't), but I think my biggest takeaway was on the need for mourning and memorial in the wake of catastrophe, and how little of that has been done re: Covid (in part because it's still ongoing, which he did thankfully say, though he said it in 2023 and a lot of people have changed their minds in the intervening two years). Anyway, I suspect I'm in a stage that's too bitter and angry to find consolation in this book.
Yield Under Great Persuasion by Alexandra Rowland
If I hadn't had a strong rec from a friend for this one, I'd have put it down in the second chapter. To be clear, I'm glad I didn't, the middle part of this book was very enjoyable (even if the climax once again didn't do much for me--the magic that was going on was cool, but it was also the main character walking in circles around a tree monologuing his way into sort of agreeing to marry his love interest by saying a million times what a terrible idea it was), a worthy 100th read of the year, but oof. The marketing I saw for the book mentioned it being about difficult people still being worthy of love, and that's true, but I can't say it was enjoyable to read the main character be an Absolute Asshole to the extent that a literal goddess had to metaphorically hit him upside the head to get him to even begin to stop. I complained to my friend that this really should have been dual POV because for a good long time I could not for the life of me see why this guy's love interest wanted to spend time with him. I get that while this gets some romancey marketing it's really more of a character development story, Rowland likes those, but I don't know. There was some cool worldbuilding and some good bones going on here, but the character work didn't do it for me. I saw what Rowland was doing at every point, and I feel like this is the perfect story for a lot of people! I just spent a lot of this book feeling incredibly sorry for the love interest and wanting to tell him that he doesn't have to do this with someone who has hurt him so deeply so many times.
And that's all for this time! Hopefully you will see me again before November.
The Facts and Fictions of Minna Pratt by Patricia MacLachlan
A reread of a childhood favorite, and truly this book has stood the test of time! It's sharp and funny and sweet and sad, it understands being a young music student and a kid figuring your life out, it teaches vocabulary words while being honest about that but also not boring about it, the ending is on my mental list of "I want to be able to end stories in ways that feel this satisfying and competent and perfect," it's just a triumph of a book and packs a whole lot of punch into its very short length. It's a pity I don't really know any 10-year-olds because I want to give it as a gift to someone but don't really know who I would give it to.
Green Grow the Rushes by Caitrín Casey
A little fantasy (for a given value thereof) romance. Also, weirdly, second book I've read recently that includes a proxy marriage as a plot point? Which I'm into, I love marriage tropes, let's have more of that. Anyway, never know how I feel about fantasy where there's not really any magic happening, it's just that the author clearly had a time-and-place vibe they were going for (Medieval Ireland, I'm fairly sure), but didn't want to get bogged down in the details of real people and real geography--I mean, I guess better this setting than making historians sad? Anyway, this was a slow, thoughtful book, didn't get me deeply, but was enjoyable.
French Leave by Sheri Cobb Smith
I was reading this expecting it to be more modern Regency romance vibes, but this is VERY much in the tradition of Heyer (I actually picked it up because I'd started a Heyer and realized it was a reread and decided it wasn't one I liked enough to reread, and the things they have in common, down to the heroine being 17 and the hero being 35, were baffling to me), and it didn't really do much for me. I was rather looking forward to engaging with the nun thing that's part of the premise more, but it was all very slight, and cared a lot about a misunderstanding subplot between the characters from a previous book in this series, so in general, not my thing.
Rinkitink in Oz by L. Frank Baum
My least favorite Oz book so far! Largely because it's barely an Oz book, Dorothy and Ozma only appear for a very short time towards the end, clearly Baum's annoyed concession to being able to market it as an Oz book. But also because Rinkitink is fat and oh boy does Baum find that an excuse for comedy. Just an exhausting read. If I weren't a completionist I doubt I'd have finished.
Aniara by Harry Martinson trans. Stephen Klass & Leif Sjöberg
There was a link to this in a Reactor article about a movie adaptation, and since I'd already read one sci fi novel in verse this year, I thought I'd give this one a try too! It was definitely a weird one, I'm still not sure what all to say about it, though goodness, Calypso had it all through its DNA, didn't it? A lot of interesting commonalities around what happens when people are on a fairly doomed voyage long-term across the vast expanse of space. Not entirely to my taste, really, but at the very least an interesting stretch.
A Pale Light in the Black by K.B. Wagers
Sci fi rather like if The Expanse did the Coast Guard, is the best way I can explain this. So, this book had a lot of things that were fun for me, with some found family and some interesting mystery and some competence, but it also missed out on a lot of the reason I was willing to give some somewhat military-bent sci fi a try, which is the rescues, since I'm so into rescue shows right now! There were a couple, but they were pretty glossed over and not a huge part of the book by volume. And a lot of the book by volume went to the preparation for and the hand-to-hand matches in some inter-branch military competitive games, but then a huge amount of the actual games themselves, including the winning moments, just got completely glossed over? I'm debating whether I'll read the next one or not.
Ink Blood Sister Scribe by Emma Törzs
Lent to me by my uncle. This took me a bit to get into, but I ended up really enjoying it! Fast-paced and interesting plot, interesting and rather brutal magic system, characters I could sympathize with, just generally a good way to spend a few days of reading time! I wish I had more to say about it? But I don't! It was a good book, I'd recommend it to--hmm, I think specifically if I knew anybody who wanted to give fantasy a try but spends more time reading general fiction and who I knew didn't mind violence and blood. The people who I would recommend Alix Harrow to if they generally prefer slower-paced reads.
The Lost Princess of Oz by L. Frank Baum
Conversely to the last Oz book I read, this one delighted me! Lots of the girls, which I enjoy (and there were at least three moments very early on where I went "wow, Mr. Baum, that does NOT read straight to a modern audience"), and a fun plot, even if after a while it stretches credulity that there should be so many entirely unknown corners of Oz. Also I can't profess to enjoy the continual lesson of "I mean, magic is cool, but only Ozma, Glinda, and the Wizard should be allowed to use it, anyone else might abuse it" that Baum was into, but whatever. I think I have four Oz books written by Baum to go? I'm not going to read those by other authors.
Surviving Our Catastrophes by Robert J. Lifton
A slim nonfic volume I read largely because I had a square on my book bingo card for reading something off the library's new nonfiction shelf. This is about Covid and climate change, but it's about them through the lens of Lifton's long career (he is, I believe, in his 90s--pardon me, was! He died at age 99 a month ago today, I just looked him up, I hadn't known before) as a psychologist doing work on the massive traumas of Hiroshima and the Holocaust. He glances off a lot of things, and I'm not sure how I feel about it overall (my mother, who also read it, was hit very hard by it, and baffled that I wasn't), but I think my biggest takeaway was on the need for mourning and memorial in the wake of catastrophe, and how little of that has been done re: Covid (in part because it's still ongoing, which he did thankfully say, though he said it in 2023 and a lot of people have changed their minds in the intervening two years). Anyway, I suspect I'm in a stage that's too bitter and angry to find consolation in this book.
Yield Under Great Persuasion by Alexandra Rowland
If I hadn't had a strong rec from a friend for this one, I'd have put it down in the second chapter. To be clear, I'm glad I didn't, the middle part of this book was very enjoyable (even if the climax once again didn't do much for me--the magic that was going on was cool, but it was also the main character walking in circles around a tree monologuing his way into sort of agreeing to marry his love interest by saying a million times what a terrible idea it was), a worthy 100th read of the year, but oof. The marketing I saw for the book mentioned it being about difficult people still being worthy of love, and that's true, but I can't say it was enjoyable to read the main character be an Absolute Asshole to the extent that a literal goddess had to metaphorically hit him upside the head to get him to even begin to stop. I complained to my friend that this really should have been dual POV because for a good long time I could not for the life of me see why this guy's love interest wanted to spend time with him. I get that while this gets some romancey marketing it's really more of a character development story, Rowland likes those, but I don't know. There was some cool worldbuilding and some good bones going on here, but the character work didn't do it for me. I saw what Rowland was doing at every point, and I feel like this is the perfect story for a lot of people! I just spent a lot of this book feeling incredibly sorry for the love interest and wanting to tell him that he doesn't have to do this with someone who has hurt him so deeply so many times.
And that's all for this time! Hopefully you will see me again before November.
no subject
And I've been meaning to rec you Edith Pattou's East, if you haven't read it. Not lifechanging, but a good solid fairy tale retelling that I think you'd enjoy.
no subject
I think I read that one back in high school and now I can't remember a thing about it other than the obvious outlines of the retelling! Perhaps I should give it a reread.
no subject
Two whole marriage-by-proxy books? What is the other?
no subject
no subject