Science Fiction Reading in February 2017

[Hobbit]

The year rolls on....

As normal, here's where you tell us about what you've been reading in Science Fiction this month. Good or bad, we want to know what you think.

 

[Chuffalump]

I've been reading the Red Rising series by Pierce Brown. Really enjoying it (and the break from anime). The books have some very clear inspirations in Dune, probably ASOIAF and Hunger Games, Warhammer 40K, maybe a bit of Enders Game. We're not talking ground breaking or anything like that but plenty of death, betrayal, tragedy, moral quandary etc.

The first book was in a kindle offer but it was entertaining enough for me to shell out nearly a tenner for the sequels.

 

[chitman13]

I finished The Hangman's Daughter by Gavin Smith this morning, and I quite enjoyed it. As I've said before, it's got some interesting characters and the premise really helps power the plot along. There are a couple of things I need to go back and look over as I'm not sure whether I just missed a couple of explanations or that they aren't there (at least not explicitly), then I'll get to writing up my thoughts for a proper review. But overall, good stuff.

Powering through Aliens: Rogue too, and while there are a couple of things that have annoyed me, it's generally a good book so far.

 

[Av Demeisen]

I'm putting Ninefox Gambit aside for the time being. Think I'll start Paul McAuley's Fairyland after I'm back from walking the dog.

 

[Av Demeisen]

I'm putting Ninefox Gambit aside for the time being. Think I'll start Paul McAuley's Fairyland after I'm back from walking the dog.

Good move. I feel like I can breath again. This is one of the hardcovers I bought from Cold Tonnage Books last December.

 

[Westy]

^^ I started it a couple of days ago and put it down after a few chapters; seemed too muddled to me.

 

[Av Demeisen]

I'm surprised it got so many four and five star reviews at Goodreads. I thought the most amusing and telling review was this two starred piece, though I do not necessarily agree with everything it says.

 

[Westy]

I'm surprised it got so many four and five star reviews at Goodreads. I thought the most amusing and telling review was this two starred piece, though I do not necessarily agree with everything it says.

Haha! Yeah I actually read that review (amongst others) after I put it down, just to see if it wasn't just me who couldn't get into it...

 

[chitman13]

I read Ninefox Gambit last year and found it okay, but not particularly great. Also, as others have said, it's rather confusing. I think it's one of those novels in the same category of Ancillary Justice - hits with some readers, misses with others (I thought it was somewhere in the middle).

Finished Aliens: Rogue last night. Very enjoyable despite some minor issues and one big annoyance. I'll be moving on the the next one in this third omnibus, Aliens: Labyrinth, and then reviewing them both together.

 

[Diosces]

Just picked up Hell Divers by Nicholas Smith from Union Square Barnes and Noble!

 

[Goldsmith]

Almost half way through "Long Way to a Small Angry Planet". So far I am disappointed as everything is too nicety-nice with no conflict and very little happening. Hoping it picks up as I was really looking forward to this one. I have been on a trend lately of not finishing books and being disappointed in them.

 

[Hobbit]

I have been on a trend lately of not finishing books and being disappointed in them.

Sounds familiar.... though at the moment this is what's happening in Fantasy Books for me rather than SF.

Books do not always work for everyone. I accept that some books are not for me, even when popular opinion would suggest that I am wrong!

 

[Contrarius]

Almost half way through "Long Way to a Small Angry Planet". So far I am disappointed as everything is too nicety-nice with no conflict and very little happening.

That's pretty much how I felt about it too. It was nice, but it wasn't exciting or engrossing. I just didn't care that much.

 

[Westy]

Finished reading Robert Charles Wilson's latest, Last Year. In the near future a passageway has been opened to last 19th century Ohio, and a town has been built tourism of the future. There's an attempt on the President and Jesse and Elizabeth (from the past and the future respectively) must investigate, before the passage closes up.

This was a good enough read, more focused on the characters and relationships than any hard science (which is the author's way), but ultimately a fairly by-the-numbers novel.

 

[Contrarius]

I finished All the Birds in the Sky by Charlie Jane Anders yesterday. Not sure whether to stick it in Fantasy or Science Fiction, but I'll flip a coin and put it here.

I gotta say that I don't really get all the hype about this book. It's essentially "Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus"/"Can't We All Just Get Along?" Sure, some of the scientists are women and some of the witches are men, but the focus is obvious -- as is the theme throughout. We need both science and magic, both head and heart, both the rational and the emotional, yadda yadda yadda blah blah blah.

Additionally, I didn't really appreciate the narrative voice. Sure, I laughed out loud a couple of times; humor is a good thing. But the tone often seemed smug and perhaps dismissive to me, which I'm not fond of. I was especially unfond of the ending --

Spoiler

Seriously?? The "solution" was to have the computer and the tree fall in love? They couldn't merge into an integrated system or recognize that they were two parts of a coherent whole or something? Nooooo -- they had to follow the heteronormative cultural paradigm (complete with the "male" computer being inserted into the "female" tree, no less) and run off to essentially get married?? Sheesh!

Ahem. Thanks, I feel much better.

The narration was adequate, except for occasional inexplicable pronunciation gaffes (she pronounced the word "heron" as "HEEEron", for heaven's sake). Not much in the way of accents or voice characterizations, but I didn't get confused about who was speaking.

A flat three stars from me!

 

[Av Demeisen]

I just finished the first part of Fairyland. Very gripping so far.

 

[Contrarius]

I finished The Wolf Road by Beth Lewis. I can't say anything about it without spoiler tags. LOL. Actually, I could -- but since the book wasn't at all what I expected it to be, I won't spoil it for other people! Spoiler tag commence!

Spoiler

First off -- this is only on the vague periphery of sff in that the backgrounding is far-ish postapocalyptic instead of the original gold rush era in British Columbia. There's no magic and no tech that we don't already have (except possibly for some of the biotech that was in the bombs dropped during the far-distant apocalyptic war). The story itself could have taken place in the 1800s aside from incidental things like the existence of plastic chairs and doxycycline and the occasional availability of electricity from generators, but the difference in background does make a big difference in the message conveyed by the book -- namely that a beast is present in all of us, that we must choose to fight that beast, and that we must be ever-vigilant in our battle. The beast is illustrated by history (the past war is known as the Big Damned Stupid), by the physical scars left on the land (like a bomb-crater lake that remains poisonous), by the weather (these days there are frequent massive hurricane-like storms even in the Yukon, known as "thunderheads"), by the man who raises our MC, and by the MC herself and her travelling companions. Although the course of the book is not all that original -- many books feature an MC fighting against their own worse nature and the worse parts of both humanity and nature, as in a good number of westerns -- this one is well done and gets the message across very effectively without being offensively obvious (like, say, All the Birds in the Sky was).

This is written in first-person vernacular, which might have been annoying to read, but it was narrated convincingly in the audio version. We follow Elka, our MC, as she runs from her erstwhile foster father, who near the beginning of the book (and as told to us in the blurb, so it isn't a spoiler) has turned out to be a murderer. Now, here's the essential spoilery bit: I thought this was a werewolf story of some sort! But it isn't! I kept expecting Elka to eventually see him shift -- and there's all sorts of hints throughout most of the book that he will eventually -- but all those hints and pointers turn out to be the smartass author (I mean that fondly) referring to his inner beastly nature and to Elka's own shifting memories and perceptions and character. Sheesh -- way to lead me astray!

Lewis is also a smartass in playing the "repressed memories slowly returning" game, which can be intensely annoying and is annoyingly convenient for the author in allowing the revelation of bits and pieces of the backstory whenever Lewis wants you to know them. I thought this part of the story was less successful, especially since it was pretty easy to figure out what each drib and drab was going to be before it was revealed to us. And further, there are times that the heroine seemed TSTL even for someone who had spent most of her life in the woods -- but I may be judging the author too harshly here, because it never was claimed that Elka was especially bright in the first place.

And then there's the wolf companion, who was a fun character but presented much too heavy a hand in ramming Lewis's message home -- Look! It's called the Wolf Road! Here we are with a wolf befriending our heroine! Wow, what a nifty metaphor for wildness and our beast nature! -- and also was much too much the Lassie of the wolfie world (seriously, I thought Elka was going to ask "Did Timmy fall down the well?" at one point).

Over all, though, I enjoyed the story. There's good, vivid imagery, an interesting heroine with a moving character arc, interesting moral ambiguity, and colorful secondary characters who feel thicker than cardboard. Coupled with a good narrator, I give this a solid four.

Spoiler

Just don't be disappointed when nobody goes furry.

 

[Contrarius]

And now I'm an hour into Too Like the Lightning by Ada Palmer. I love the beginning -- it's rich, graceful, and intriguing. I'm looking forward to the rest of the book.

 

[chitman13]

And now I'm an hour into Too Like the Lightning by Ada Palmer. I love the beginning -- it's rich, graceful, and intriguing. I'm looking forward to the rest of the book.

I could not get into that book, and I just can't put my finger on why. Ahh well, plenty more books on the shelf...

 

[Westy]

I could not get into that book, and I just can't put my finger on why. Ahh well, plenty more books on the shelf...

I'm the same - a few popular SF books recently that I couldn't - this, Ninefox Gambit and (from a while ago) Ancillary Justice. I just found them too convoluted/complex/didn't flow - for me anyway.