Quinaquisset reads 50 for '14

Last year I got through 52, we'll see how well I do this year!

January
1. Shadows by McKinley
2. Republic of Thieves by Lynch
3. Einstein Intersection by Delany
4. Spirit Thief by Aaron (partial)

February
5. Little Brother by Doctorow
6. Cape Cod by Thoreau

March
a bit of Frankenstein
7. Broken Homes by Aaronovitch
8. Bastion by Lackey

April
9. To Be or Not to Be by North
10. A Liaden Constellation by Lee &Miller
11. The Martian by Weir
15. Conservation of Shadows by Lee
12. A Bad Spell in Yurt by Brittain

May
13. Evolution by Baxter
14. The Science of Herself by Fowler
16. The Wood Nymph and the Cranky Saint by Brittain
17. London Falling by Cornell

June
18. My Real Children by Walton
19. Dead Ever After by Harris
20. Selected Works of T.S. Spivet by Larsen
21. The Goblin Emperor by Addison
22. Without a Summer by Kowal
23. The Sea of Time by Hodgell
24. Parasite by Grant

July
25. Unnatural Dykes to Watch Out For by Bechdel
26. The Rhesus Chart by Stross
27. The Islands of Chaldea by Jones

Aug
28. Oryx and Crake
29. Artemis Awakening by Lindskold
30. Frida Kahlo: Brush with Anguish by Zamora
31. The Bonehunters by Erikson
32. Legacy by Schmitz
33. Skin Game by Butcher

Sept
34. Crown of Renewal by Moon
35. Siduri's Net by MacAllister
36. Soulless by Carriger
37. Valour and Vanity by Kowal
38. The Severed Streets by Cornell
39. Alif the Unseen by Wilson

Oct
40. Neuromancer by Gibson
41. Hawk by Brust
42. Etiquette and Espionage by Carriger
43. Ancillary Sword by Leckie
44. A Darkling Sea by Cambias

Nov
45. Clariel by Nix

Dec
46. What If by Munroe
47. The Book of General Ignorance by Lloyd and Mitchenson
48. Ten Methods of the Heavenly Dragon by Sheaffer
49. The Slow Regard of Silent Things by Rothfuss
50. The Dark of Deep Below by Rothfuss

Shadows by Robin McKinley


We have a bookstore downtown that used to be only children's books, back when we had three bookstores in town. There was a dwindling of bookstores, and one last competitive gasp about one block over, and this store started to carry adult titles too, which is good because it's now the only bookstore left in town. But they have a good selection of YA sff in the back, and that's where I found the McKinley, which I hadn't realized was coming out. (I was expecting another Pegasus book.) I really enjoyed this one. The underlying story about adjusting to her father's death and her relationship with the new stepfather isn't one that applies to me happily, and the teenage romance doesn't really get me, but the images of the coiling shadows...and the slobbering dogs...and the origami chapter headers...and the best friend who's not perfect but reliable. Plus worldbuilding where things aren't spelled out, you just get a feel for the world trying to suppress magical mayhem. It's not the same world as Sunshine, but similar views towards authority, and similar contemporary setting; it doesn't end with a cliff hanger (that's you, Pegasus). It's dedicated to Diana Wynne Jones, but the vibe I get out of it is more Nina Kiriki Hoffman.

Happy reading in 2014.

2. Republic of Thieves by Scott Lynch



Book 3 of an ongoing series, goes into the relationship of Locke and Sabetha. The continuing adventures and flashbacks of a group of con artists. Thumbs up. Good diversity of cast, but it's a long book. Enjoyable caper stories.

3. The Einstein Intersection by Samuel Delany



Reread, but since I don't remember it at all seems like a first read. Psychedelic new wave sf from the sixties, with lots of mythological underpinnings. A mutant with the power of music trying to find the man who killed his girlfriend, and maybe bring her back; he runs into characters similar to Jesus, Satan, and Judas along the way; it's also possible that they map onto the Beatles. Unlike RoT, very short.
And hey, Delany autographed my copy 15 years ago.

4. The Spirit Thief by Rachel Aaron

As part of my attempt to weed out my TBR pile, I read the first fifty pages, but since I didn't connect with the characters I jumped to the end. There was one subplot that seemed interesting about a woman who controlled her demonic possession due to her love for a man (or his sword, it wasn't clear), but it wasn't enough to make me want to read the rest.

5. Little Brother by Cory Doctorow



I reread most of this for our book club. Everyone liked it. Good informative bits about privacy on the internet, tor pirate routers, and cryptography. Not as good on characters, but engaging to read. Teenage hackers vs Department of Homeland Security, guess who wins.

Tried to re-read Frankenstein for book club, but it was boring and I had an ebook version and I was reading about an arctic chase while I was sitting in the sunny Caribbean.
Most of the others in my club had difficulty too. One person said it was better as originally written, starting with the reanimate on scene.
This is our town's Everyone Read book.

Cape Cod by Henry David Thoreau



I also got far enough through Thoreau's Cape Cod Travels book. Cape Cod before roads and tourists. A different landscape. Okay, I can see it being assigned reading in schools for the literary value.

7. Broken Homes by Ben Aaronovitch



#4 in the Peter Grant wizard bobby series. I still love the characters voice, his multiculturalness, and the worldbuilding, with the undead housekeeper, river spirits popping up every now and then, and a police force that knows about magic but wishes they didn't. Unexpected details about architecture, I have to go back to previous books and see if that's been a theme. Highly recommended. Set in contemporary London (including google and smart phones and all the surveillance cams of British society)

8. Bastion by Mercedes Lackey

#5 in the Collegium Chronicles, #how-many-has-she-written? in the Valdemar series. This reminds me of gradually letting go of the Xanth series, after a certain point you know the formulaic plotting just isn't going to get better. Learn better, read the first two trilogies and stop, in the knowledge of diminishing returns.
On a brighter note, I got this as an ebook from the library, and it was one of my better e-reading experiences. Really quick, for one thing.

To Be or Not To Be by Ryan North



This was a lot of fun. Hamlet as a Choose Your Own Adventure, for all of us who thought Hamlet was a bit of a nonsensical prat. Ophelia gets to be awesome. There are wacky deaths and interesting 'better' endings. It almost makes me want to go back and reread the original. Almost. The hyperlinks worked great for navigation on my tablet, you can choose one path and then backtrack easily once you peter out without having to start from the beginning. The art by different cartoonists is enjoyable. I spent an enjoyable travel weekend dipping in and out of this.

10. A Liaden Constellation Volume 2 by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller



For Liaden fans only, these short stories follow various sidelines, such as Natesha's backstory, Kareen escaping the bad guys, the tree arriving on Surebleak, and other characters who interact obliquely with the Korval clan (or who illuminate Liaden culture). For romantic space opera, these two have a good formula, with entertaining diverse characters that I love to cheer for. If you haven't read much of this multi-book series, I recommend starting with Agent of Change.

11. The Martian by Andy Weir



Wow. This is a lock for a Hugo nomination next year. I wonder if Weir is eligible for a Campbell award for best new writer? I know his work from his (completed) webcomic Casey and Andy, about two mad scientists, quantum cops and thieves, Satan, and very little realism. This amps up the realism by 100%. Lots of science and math, but also a very engaging set of characters, particularly the lonely astronaut stranded on Mars. Most everything is told from his viewpoint as he figures out how to survive on minimal supplies--exciting like Apollo 13 or Gravity.

And note, last December I said of Ancillary Justice "Potential Hugo nominee!" So I've got a pretty good record going here.

12. A Bad Spell in Yurt by C. Dale Brittain



I signed up on her email list, to keep track if she ever wrote another story, and found out that her Yurt series is going audio. So I dusted off my Audible subscription just for her.

So twenty year after first reading this story (choke) I can see it's flaws fairly well--it's a mixup of feudal rule and quasi-contemporary technology (telephones, newspapers), and there's nothing but tradition that keeps wizards from taking over rulership of the kingdoms (I believe this comes up later in the series), the boys-club sense of the wizard school rather rankles. I'm bothered by maintaining the same religious structures we have, in a world where saints and demons can effect the world directly. And someone goes from last in his class in wizardry to astounding magical feats in a year.

But, it's still fun, despite all of that. Any scene where the magician and priest talk together can make me smile. Daimbert is so aware of his limitations, while attempting to look all-powerful, that he still comes across quite humbly. And it is a charming storybook kingdom, with its rose garden and happy servants and the cross-dressing Duchess. And I know where she's going with all of this, and trust her to tell a good story. But I'm not sure someone else would get the same bang out of it, without the emotional bond I have for the story.

Part of that bond being that I picked up this story after hearing a library talk between Brittain, Bujold (who I was already reading) and Dennis McKiernan, who was in his Tolkien clone phase. The phrase 'the affair with the frogs' still sticks with me.

13. Evolution by Steven Baxter



Read this for book club. It's a series of vignettes, showing how we evolved from small shrews into primates and humans. There is a fair amount of fiction/speculation here, difficult to tell exactly which bits are researched (although the air whales and tool-using dinosaurs seem fairly fictional). In the early parts he throws around a lot of unfamiliar species names, while pointing out which ones will turn into horses or elephants. The breadth of the stories is huge, covering all the earth (except maybe Antarctica) and form 160 million years in the past to a handful of speculative future stories, ending 500 million years later (which was fairly depressing). It's sense of time is its biggest idea, really making you feel the millennia passing. But there are no main characters to cheer for, outside of the framing story. I'd put it as dry but compelling.

14. The Science of Herself by Karen Joy Fowler



This is a slim collection of some of her short stories, and an interview with the author. My favorite is the title story, about Mary Anning the amateur paleontologist (you might remember her recent google doodle). She looks at her through the lens of Jane Austen, how the two women may have been different, and missed crossing paths. But Mary is a fascinating character in her own right, digging up ichthyosaurs and selling fossils from a shop, winning grudging respect from the establishment scientists.

Both of these also benefitted from coinciding with the new TV version of Cosmos. From the physics of the asteroid impact, to the discussions of evolution, continental drift, and overlooked women in science, all of which were nicely illustrated. Thanks Neil DeGrasse Tyson.

15. Conservation of Shadows by Yoon Ha Lee



This should really be back in April, but renumbering is a pain. This was a collection of short stories that I got from the library, short version would be a gleeful 'feminist Asian sf/fantasy'. Most do have some Asian flavor to the culture, I don't know enough to pin it down to a particular culture. There was a beautiful fantasy story about a war with words, and an unusual gun and its dedicated owner, a couple unusual interplanetary war stories. She likes to play with language, and time/destiny, and expectations. Some are high fantasy, some are space fiction. Highly recommended.

16. The Wood Nymph and the Cranky Saint by C. Dale Brittain


whitewashed, misleading cover again

Book #2 in the Yurt series. I really enjoyed these books thirty years ago, a bit less now. They are in the cozy fantasy genre, where everyone is happy with their positions (unless they are hoping to get married), there's the romance of kings and castles but also the conveniences of magical indoor lighting and telephones. There is a fantasy Christianity, which continues to come off well, although more focussed on saints than on Christ. But the storyline about the Duchess' love life, and shaming women for appearing impure, was bothersome, minimally mitigated by the priest pointing out that the men also needed to be pure.
Audiobook wise, the narrator does a good job, but a couple places someone didn't realize they had hit 'play' on the background music, and had the volume up too loud...
Short version--popcorn reading.

17. London Falling by Paul Cornell



Another supernatural cop in London series (similar to the Aaronovitch above), but this time there is no mentor, and there are four slightly disgraced cops who are suddenly thrust into the magical world that overlies our contemporary one. It started off really slow and mundane, I'm glad that I jumped ahead a few chapters to get to the real plot, chasing down a magical serial killer. Nicely diverse cast, and I appreciate the glossary in the back for London places and slang. Once past all the undercover cop stuff it was well paced and interesting, with genuinely different viewpoints. First in a series.

18. My Real Children by Jo Walton



One of the best things about Walton, besides her easy writing style, is that all of her books are so different from each other, but still interesting. This one falls into contemporary alternate history. I thought it rather like the movie Sliding Doors, where you see the two paths a person's life can take after a major crossroads, but since this is a book and not a two hour movie you spend much more time, most of a lifetime (two lifetimes) watching this character grow, and the next generations, until she reaches her senile end that is foreshadowed at the beginning of the book. But then the question comes up, a life of personal pain in a more peaceful world, or a life of love where people are generally less tolerant? Now I want to go back and reread it and see if I can spot just why the two worlds diverged so radically, and the different social backgrounds. Trigger warning for impending Alzheimers, which is shown in a heartlessly faithful way.

19. Dead Ever After by Charlaine Harris



Thank heavens for someone who knows how to wrap up a series. I was very happy with Sookie's chosen life partner. And the evidence of all the friends she has now, when her main characteristic at the start of the series was being fairly friendless, due to her 'disability'. If the ending is a bit too tidy, well, that was foreshadowed in the early housecleaning scenes.

20. Selected Works of T.S. Spivet by Reif Larsen



This looked interesting, and started off well. A boy genius, a prodigy at mapping, leaves his isolated Montana home to travel to Washington DC. There are cool little drawings and side notes. But the ending was awfully weak. It also broke my disbelief. It's a first novel, so maybe Larsen will Learn Better.

21. The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison (aka Sarah Monette)



The black sheep of the royal family is the only one spared from a lethal disaster, leaving him heir to the throne. Raised to know etiquette, but not current politics, first by a loving mother, then by an abusive uncle, he is thrown into the deep end of plots and court life. Tight third person, we spend so much time in Maia's head, it's a relief that he is such a nice person. Per the author's website, no sequels are planned. Hopefully this gets her out of the disregarded pile, it was quite lovely.

22. Without a Summer by Mary Robinette Kowal



Book 3 in the Glamour series, Vincent and Jane still happily married, but now that they are back in London they run into his poisonous family. Jane's sister is there for matchmaking. Still Austen skewed, but we see the casual racism of the time (of which Jane starts to Learn Better). Well written with interesting characters, and not shying away from the social changes of the Industrial Revolution.

The Sea of Time by P.C. Hodgell



Book 7 of her series. Still very inventive, with a return to an urban setting again, allowing Jame to play thief again as she did in the first (best) book. Details from the pre-story keep getting revealed, and the characters keep maturing.
Can I say that they still have not found a good visual for the covers? At least the annoying buxomness is gone. To Ride a Rathorn did the best with the armored horse.

Half year summary

12 fantasy
7 sf
2 other (essays, choose-your-own)
3 collections

12.5 female authors
10.5 male authors

5 female main characters
10 male main characters
(not counting multiple POVs, collections, other)

24. Parasite by Mira Grant



I feel like those nerdragers, 'what the heck is this doing on the Hugo ballot?' TBH, the entire novel ballot has been screwed over this year, but between the politicking I'm still hopeful that my favorite, Ancillary Justice, will still prevail. Parasite is an amusing conceit stretched too long (I suspect trilogy, but even this book is too slow). It was painful seeing the main character ignoring what I (and I think all the other players in the book) suspected about her condition. Grant did a fairly good job of world-changing in Feed (except the lack of economics of isolation still bother me) and did a really poor job of it here. And she doesn't seem to be able to write villains who don't seem cartoony. At least this one wasn't the cackling hand-rubbing villain--this one was more in the dotcom fashion of screwing over people for massive money/market shares. The writing, as opposed to the plotting, is okay. I'm steering my book club away from this one.

Our library is having its annual summer outdoor booksale. I hope they were protected against the driving rain this evening from Hurricane Arthur (which happily is well offshore). I've come to realize that I already have more books than I can read in a year, and I need to be more discerning about what I bring into the house. So I kept myself down to three new sf and one reread, and two new humor books. But i successfully pushed Le Guin's dispossessed onto one teenage boy, and the Chronicles of Chrestomanci to a mother whose daughter likes Tamora Pierce and Susan Cooper (I told her Jones would be better than the Dune books she was looking at).

Unnatural Dykes to Watch Out For by Alison Bechdel



Picked up at the humor section at our local booksale, mentioned above. Bechdel's test is now a widespread media critique tool. I knew it came from a comic, and was curious about its roots. This is a collection from the mid 90s, and since it's a contemporary story it's like a time machine to an era before iPhones and gay marriage. She's got a broad array of characters who have multiple types of angst, and a fair amount of sex. I enjoyed it.

26. The Rhesus Chart by Charles Stross



#5 in the Laundry Series, which crosses Lovecraftian horrors with James Bond and bureaucratic culture. In this one, we see yet a new version of vampires, with ectoplasmic brain parasites. And high-test corporate business, all sprints and projections and brainstorming (but with many more buzzwords). Poor Bob, our hero, gets further sucked into the world of inane meetings, with occasional outbursts of necromantic action. And now he has a cat. Compulsively readable and funny (especially if you don't have to sit on committees).

27. The Islands of Chaldea by Diana Wynne Jones



When Diana Wynne Jones died a few years ago she left an uncompleted manuscript, and no notes. Her sister Ursula Jones finished it for publication, which is most visible in the rushed ending. So it's not a good introduction for Jones (for which I'd recommend Howl's Moving Castle or The Game). But for completists, you can still see her brilliance shining through, as she upsets my expectations of plot.

28. Oryx and Crake



Read for out book club, and was surprised that it got such a positive reception. For now I'm calling it a post-apocalyptic utopia, about a lone survivor and the group of genetically modified people (not humans) he watches over. There's extended flashbacks over his life, including wacky mad science behind gated communities, and his psychopathic (title) friends. First in a recently completed trilogy. I enjoyed it, but didn't feel it as literarily good as some of my compadres.

I read most of this while on my vacation, cruising up the Douro river in Portugal. A lovely trip, with lots of port wine!

29. Artemis Awakening by Jane Lindskold



Ah, if only I'd read the back blurbs, the first one talks about waiting for the sequel. There's an end to the story arc here, but you get that heavy feeling as the pages unread shrink that final resolution is going to wait for another story. Anyway, this is a 'lost' planet, created as a playground for rich planetary aristocrats, which includes some odd genetic engineering in the animals and people of this world; an outsider crashes and gets shown around while looking for some usable tech. Some interesting ideas, but I feel I have to reserve judgement until the next book.

30. Frida Kahlo: Brush of Anguish



Seeing this at the local library while I was feeling a gap in my art history, and it passed the test of reading a random page. A dramatic life, filled with pain and betrayal; pictures in a recognizable flat style. She will not be a favorite artist, but good to expand my horizons.

31. The Bonehunters by Steven Erikson



I tried this one a while ago, and stopped short about a hundred pages into it. I picked it up again, because the Malazan fans are so garrulous, and this time I did it as an audiobook. A really long audiobook. But I hit the endgame yesterday and spent a fair amount of time yesterday and today listening to the last couple of hours. The reader does a good job, and even though it's a cast of hundreds the different voices are pretty distinct (the names themselves not so much--I often got confused listening about Corabb, Keneb, Kalam, Cutter, Cuttle, Koryk...) It's a sprawling epic with some larger than life characters. There's lots of violence, but it gets so cartoonish sometimes, a warrior cutting through a hundred armed men by him/herself (this happens a couple of times). Avoid if imagery like 'then he ripped out the spine and swung it around like an anchor chain' makes your stomach churn (it made me laugh). But the emotional intensity also gets done very well. Hundreds of characters, and you get to really care about a lot of them. Of course don't start here on book 6--I recommend starting with the second book, Deadhouse Gates. It's a very intense series, and I'm looking forward to the next chapter.

32. Legacy by James H. Schmitz



This was a gift from ronincat, thanks! SF from 1962, an interplanetary spy caper. Trigger Argee is an action hero, although her employers tend to call her 'girl' a lot. It's a good image of 1960s view of egalitarian society through a somewhat hazy lens. There are several interesting elements, including the psychology service and the ancient alien objects, the jerky boyfriend. I could have done without the spanking, even if it wasn't shown.

33. Skin Game by Jim Butcher



Now that we're on the other side of Changes (by three books) we're seeing Harry start to accumulate things, where the first half of the series he keeps getting things destroyed instead...in this one he gets a new staff. (Also some spoilery stuff.) There was a strong motif of the bond of fatherhood here, which didn't ring true to this particular child-free person (although I really liked Bujold's description of it as a preference for certain favored gene sets). Anyways, this is a heist caper. Butcher states early on that he's hiding some of Harry's preparations, but since this is first person POV the perspective still feels a bit forced. I like Harry's friends better than him, and there were plenty of them in this story. If you enjoyed the other 14(?) in this series, you will likely enjoy this one too.

34. Crown of Renewal by Elizabeth Moon



Book 5, and finishing the series. She pulls together ends for multiple storylines, including from Liar's Oath (and hooray for real books, I've still got a copy of that I can reread, at least parts, because the author is right in that is her most unpleasant book). There's a whole bunch of deus ex machina but that's nothing new for this series. Not having reread the previous books of this series there were some parts I felt adrift in--ie the king's toque. Overall a satisfying read for Paksenarrion fans, but I don't think it will gain Ms Moon new converts.

For the series as a whole--the author has progressed from the fairly tight POV and linear storylines of Deed of Paksenarrion, through the multiple character arcs of Hunting Party et al, to this larger epic about healing the world. You gain the wider array of actions, but lose the sympathy with the characters. Individuals get some shining moments, but they don't stand out to me like the high points of DoP. I don't see myself as rereading this series either for the gestalt of the story or for inspiration.

35. Siduri's Net by P.K. MacAllister



Read for book club, did not draw me in. I skipped the middle half of the book. Romani in space, explores clan identity vs small town/spaceship ties, rebounding from bad relationships. Hard science, with 'sails' collecting exotic particles/molecules.

36. Soulless by Gail Carriger



Book 1. I'd read book 2 before and wasn't impressed, possible due to middle book syndrome (and a bit of a downer). This one followed the usual romantic trope of two characters initially antagonistic who fall for each other. Victorian steampunk, including the goggles and blimps, plus vampires and werewolves. What stretched my believability? The romantic scene in the prison cell. I did get through this one pretty quickly.

Valour and Vanity by Mary Robinette Kowal



Vincent and Jane travel to Italy to consult with glassmakers, in a conceit carried forward from the second book, and have many adventures that try their relationship, including poverty, work issues, pride, chronic illness, and family. There's also Lord Byron, happily swimming in the canals, some lovely nuns (Jane finally gets over her anti-Catholicism), the virtuous Signor Spada, a helpful puppeteer, angry glassmakers, and several scam artists. The relationship issues are quite real and well developed. The magical background continues to be rather slight. A pleasant read overall.

38. The Severed Streets by Paul Cornell



Book #2 (see >17 quinaquisset:) in his series about a group of cops in London who are able to see the supernatural side of the city, trying to solve a set of supernaturally done murders within the framework of the mundane world, as their city falls prey to rioters.

Let's compare to Aaronovitchs similar series--here we have multiple viewpoints and motives, vs Peter Grant's lonely squad. Both have a previously more active policing force in the underworld; both have a villain with a long game setting things in motion (the Smiling Man, the Faceless Man). Both use a lot of the same London landmarks. Both have animating spirits that seem a lot like local gods. And mysterious female colleagues.

The tone of Aaronovitch seems more hopeful than Cornell's, where several characters have looked into the mouth of hell. It also seems more personal, with all the action coming from the one character. Peter also gets an actual mentor, while Quill and company are much more in the dark about magic.

Don't forget the Laundry series, which doesn't seem to use the geography of London quite as much, but like the other two revels in the mundane details of bureaucracy between the terror of the unknown.

39. Alif the Unseen by G. Willow Wilson



Interesting blend of new and old, with computer hackers and jinn. The central motif is a book/computer program which turns into the falling tower of the tarot cards, promising order but bringing chaos. Setting is a modern Arabic city, with a melange of various ethnicities but the usual corruption at the top and seething unrest beneath. The computer hackers are unseen on the grey net hiding from the State. Also unseen by most are the jinn, who run from straightforward demonic masks to individuals of religion and ethics, who also like to check their email in a parallel world. Plus there's a love story, of course. All very self-contained.

40. Neuromancer by William Gibson



A reread done for our book club. Some things are dated (but need to be pointed out to me, like tv static and pay phones), and the internet isn't really what he imagined it to be, with corporate info the main thing on the web, but the language is well done with beautiful imagery, the characters are interesting if all rather morose/crazy, and the worldbuilding is well done, with the urban sprawl from Boston to Atlanta, the Japanese subcity with it's drugs and black market surgical clinics, the Russian war leaving a radioactive city in Germany, Rastafarians in space...written before the Berlin Wall came down, before cell phones and facebook and librarything. The plot is a heist story, starting with recruitment and gathering resources/tech, progressing to the actual caper and what goes wrong during it. A bit slow to read, but I and the rest of the group liked it.

41. Hawk by Stephen Brust



Book #14, out of presumably 18. This one is a caper story, with Vlad trying to pull off a deal to get off the mob-wide hit list. The plot is fairly straightforward--Vlad goes about collecting stuff while not letting his friends or the reader in on his plan. Lately there have been clever conceits in these stories, like the laundry list of accidents, and I'm not sure if I'm missing something here other than the Burn Notice voiceovers and the overlapping chapter titles. There are a couple small interesting interactions with his old friends, but I don't think this one is going to stand out for me.

42. Etiquette and Espionage by Gail Carriger



It's a young adult tale in a steampunk world, which means Ms Carriger is able to change all the inherent sexism, racism, classism if she wants to. Sophronia, a tomboy, ends up in a finishing school learning social skills, plus spy skills. My parents sent me to a charm school once, and I only wish I'd learned about the weapons possibilities of clothing rather than mundane make up and gait. And no, it didn't really take on me. But Sophronia blossoms in her new environment. Listened to on audio, by a woman with a breathless accent an a good ear for voices. Set in the same world as Soulless #36.

43. Ancillary Sword by Ann Leckie



Book #2, sequel to the Hugo award winning Ancillary Justice. Wow, I still really like this world. Breq is now the captain of a new ship, sent to a solar system where she has a personal interest to root out corruption there. The space station and agricultural planet have been maintaining ethnic divisions that should have started to fade (think slavery/castes) and Breq maneuvering through and shaking up society is wonderful to observe. Recommended if you liked the first.

A note about the 'pronoun thing'--because of her own culture, Breq refers to everyone as 'she', ignoring biological differences, as does everyone else in her culture. I think this is the best way I've seen to show a gender-blind society within the constraints of our languages. Some characters seem to me more masculine or feminine based on their actions and thought patterns, but I think that shows more of my biases than the author's. And every so often I stop to remember that I don't actually know these characters' genders, in a way that to me is not so much story-stopping as mind-expanding. It also affects the language used about sex; I particularly like that instead of sleeping your way up, you kneel to someone else. Good word choices.

44. A Darkling Sea by James L. Cambias



This is for our book club next month, my suggestion after seeing it referred to multiple times. It's a first contact story, complicated by the setting and the other aliens. It's set in an alien underwater ocean (rather like Europa in 2061) with the perils associated there; also, pitch black, so the native Ilmatarans are blind, communicating with sonar and clicking. Good worldbuilding on an alien society. The second set of aliens was more problematic. The Sholens, who were Earth's first contact, have retreated into an isolationist society and think the humans should do the same. Not all the Sholens or humans had the same agenda, which is good, but the crux of the book has the Sholens acting fairly stupidly, plus they talk a lot about consensus but only amongst themselves, they never sought consensus with humans. So a fairly good book but partially ruined by the more aggressive anti-science characters, like so much early bad sf.

45. Clariel by Garth Nix



This is a prequel to Lirael (although I don't remember the internal chronology of this series all that well.) I had the misfortune of reading the author notes at the end, and therefore knew that this is a tragedy, about the backstory of a villain that I can't really remember. It's set in the days of the old kingdom, with intact cities and lots of people using his charter magic. It starts off with a girl arriving at a city, so she gets the outsider's view, but more important is that she really wants to go back to her old home, so she's a dissatisfied outsider. And she has to go to school, and take magic lessons, but then it all turns around and we get a new story, about vengeance. Clariel is rather unlikable, and has that ya trait where she has to have things explained to her, which makes her seem rather thick. I did like that she's self-aware that she's a loner, and asexual, and she's happy with herself in her way. I've no idea how well people could read this one first--some of the magic system is a bit better explained here, but the Abhorsen's role gets fairly short shrift.

46. What If by Randall Munroe



Hugo award winning author (for his excellent comic Xkcd) has a sidebar to his What If blog, where people send extreme science questions (what happens if all the Earth's oceans drain out through the Marianas Trench?) and he reasons his way through a likely answer. You learn some about physics/science, but more about how to think about science. Plus, he has a sense of humor about it all. And stick figure drawings. What age would it be appropriate for? A precocious tweener, or a questioning high schooler with an aptitude for science/math, I'd say. But mostly for science-literate adults.

Okay, November was a real dry spell in terms of finished books. I finished my book club book (Darkling Sea) early; I listened to half an audiobook before getting bored, and am now in the middle of a freaking long Malazan audiobook again. I had a big test to study/procrastinate studying for. Also trivia and candy crush have been taking up valuable time. But I also think I just hit one of my periodic slumps, where nothing really calls to me.

I've got three books I'm working on, but reading is a hobby, I'm not about to stress over the amounts.

Besides, I still read more books than Diane.

47. The Book of General Ignorance by John Lloyd and John Mitchenson



I picked this up at a shelf at a local restaurant, where they had a book recycling shelf. It goes into a fair amount of trivia. Each section is one to two pages, starting with an 'obvious' question (If you cut an earthworm in two, do you get two earthworms) and go into why your answer is wrong, then segues into various related bits of trivia. It challenges a lot of common misconceptions. But overall, the 'gotcha' tone of the book just got me irritated.

Ten Methods of the Heavenly Dragon by Robert Sheaffer



Non-sf, non-fiction even. I have done some tai chi, so was curious to see how this was portrayed. I'm not sure if this is a genre convention for Westerners seeking Eastern enlightenment, but the narrator came across as rather a jerk, judgemental of others, setting gotcha traps, looking down on the tea house waitresses. He learned cool meditation skills, and got good at one particular exercise, but never seemed to learn much about how to be a better human. His teacher Shun Yuan, on the other hand, seemed a neat guy, happy to puncture any pomposity he found, and live without excuses.

49. The Slow Regard of Silent Things by Patrick Rothfuss



I got this one from the library, because I heard it was odd and short, yet beautiful, and it is. Auri, the main character, reminds me of Edmund from Nina Kiriki Hoffman's Red Heart of Memories--someone trying not to impose their desires on the world, but to respond to the world's need. And both characters are a bit broken, with their lack of ambition. Strangely, it also reminds me of the tai chi master Shun Yuan from the above book, who also felt the right lesson at the right time and in the right way was important, and to move with the tides, who is quite whole. It's a quite short book, a week in the life book, with beautiful interior illustrations. This is a companion book to Name of the Wind, although I suppose it could be read for its own reasons, and wordplays, and rightness.

The Dark of Deep Below by Patrick Rothfuss



This is an illustrated short tale (not for children? really? all the violence happens off camera). Book two. I bought a copy, since the prices for used books are already quite high. IMO, not as charming/scary as the first one. (Which is by recall, since I read my friend's copy of that one).

And boom, there's my fifty! With over a week (and one airplane trip) to spare.

2014 summary--

Second half {year total}
Fantasy 14 {26}
SF 8 {15}
other 5 {7}
collection 0 {3}

female author 13 {25.5}
male author 14 {24.5}

female protagonist 8 {13}
male protagonist 7 {17}
(not counting multiple POVs, others, etc)

Ending up the year split almost equally m/f in terms of authors, completely by chance. And yea for over 10% not sf/f!

My favorite reads of 2014--
My Real Children by Jo Walton
Ancillary Sword by Ann Leckie
Broken Homes by Ben Aaronovich
To Be or Not to Be by Ryan North
The Martian by Andy Weir
What If by Randall Munroe

Book I'm most waiting for in 2015--Foxglove Summer--Aaronovich left me hanging! Also more Jo Walton.
Favorite reread--Neuromancer. (I really didn't reread much this year, surprisingly)

Hugo predictions--The Martian to beat Leckie and McGuire; Munroe to win again; Guardians of the Galaxy to beat The Lego Movie (sigh).

Have a wonderful new year, ya'll.

I checked in here midyear but evidently didn't comment and forgot to star and never got back! So sorry.

We shared:
Shadows by Robin McKinley
Broken Homes by Ben Aaronovitch
A Liaden Universe Constellation by Miller and Lee
The Martian by Andy Weir
My Real Children by Jo Walton
The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison
Without a Summer by Mary Robinette Kowal
The Sea of Time by P. C. Hodgell
The Rhesus Chart by Charles Stross
Artemis Awakening by Jane Lindskold
Legacy by James H. Schmitz
Crown of Renewal by Elizabeth Moon
Soulless by Gail Carriger
Hawk by Steven Brust
Etiquette & Espionage by Gail Carriger
Ancillary Sword by Ann Leckie is in my tbr pile--soon!
Clariel by Garth Nix

And I generally felt the same as you except that I like Carriger and Moon more and Stross less. A great year of reading!

On to the 2015 thread!
http://www.librarything.com/topic/186087