1. Vicious - VE Schwab #
4☆ - all in good fun #
Summary: Victor and Eli, former college roommates, become superpowered and begin a rivalry that spans years. #
This book is childishly fun. The rivalry was intriguing, the characters interesting, it entertained me for the few hours I sat and read the book. I do not, however find the book as “amazing” as other reviews suggested. It was too cheesy for how much it tries to be gritty.
2. Meet Me in Another Life - Catriona Silvey #
3☆ - Lacking in many aspects. #
Summary: Thora and Santi are stuck in a timeloop where they meet again and again. #
(I could not avoid spoilers for this review.)
I have some problems with this book. First: the arguments about faith are so on the nose it feels juvenile. Thora and Santi’s arguments felt unrealistically written. I don’t, for a second, believe any 19 year old Physics student speaks like that.
Second: the book takes some common tropes and just genderswaps them. Santi is The Maiden and is patient and faithful. Thora is aggressive and a realist. Which is fine, usually, but Santi gets the Fridging treatment at the end where he literally DIES for Thora’s character development. Why can’t we have Thora’s character development occur 100 pages earlier instead of the last few pages where she thinks she’s making a sacrifice and realises the weight of her choices after Santi’s death?
Lastly: I feel like the ending was rushed and poorly resolved. It would have been better if we had a glimpse of Real Life after spending years and years in simulation.
3. Small Rain - Garth Greenwell #
4☆ - Decent slow read #
Summary: The narrator barely misses death and experiences medical treatment during the peak of the COVID era. #
A very slow read written in a stream-of-consciousness prose style. I did feel like the pace was sluggish at some parts, and that I skimmed through some of the medical details a little too much. The medical details were in an awkward place where there was too little detail to be scientifically interesting but too much detail to be interesting as a plot device. It was successful at inciting some medical anxiety though.
I liked the message, that life has simple pleasures that we need to be grateful for. A good weekend casual read.
4. Even Though I Knew The End - CL Polk #
3☆ - Issues with length #
Summary: A magical detective has to track down the White City Vampire as her last job. #
The book felt like it was meant to be a longer novel. It has an established couple but it would do well to show more of their romance on page, since it felt like I couldn’t be attached to the two characters with the book as it is now. It has a fantasy worldbuilding but glosses over certain points almost like the book was rushing. The pacing is too fast for my taste.
5. Empress of Salt and Fortune - Nghi Vo #
4☆ - Beautiful writing #
Summary: A handmaiden befriends Empress In-yo and hears the story of her rise. #
A good fable written as a novella with an interesting writing style. It’s not as evocative as I hoped, but the writing was genuinely beautiful enough for me to keep reading. It is a little vague and disjointed, but I enjoyed nonetheless.
6. Cursed Bunny - Bora Chung #
4☆ - One or two good stories. #
Summary: A collection of short stories by Bora Chung. #
I enjoyed the Head but I did not enjoy the other stories as much. For a horror, it wasn’t good at building atmosphere due to the scantness of the descriptions. Its criticisms on patriarchy were interesting but skin deep, which is as expected since it is a collection of short stories.
7. Things Fall Apart - Chinua Achebe #
3☆ - Prose inadequate #
Summary: Fictional warrior Okonkwo’s tribal life is changed by the presence of colonial powers in the 1800s. #
It is unfortunate that I did not particularly find this classic piece of world literature as groundbreaking to read. I can acknowledge the importance of this book for African literature but I struggled with the bland prose. It has good insights to precolonial life, and I was surprised to see that English influence only appeared in 30% of the book as opposed to what the summaries I saw mentioned. Most of the book (around 70%) details tribal life.
8. Crying of Lot 49 - Thomas Pynchon #
4☆ - Tough but masterful #
Summary: Oedipa Maas was made executor of her ex and finds herself embroiled in a mass conspiracy. #
This book is frankly, difficult to read. I would expect no less from Thomas Pynchon. I understand why most people struggled with this book and was grateful the book doesn’t have an intimidating length. The writing is intense and tends to circle back here and there and doesn’t take itself too seriously with ridiculous character names and ridiculous plot points. Anything could happen in this book, and it was an experience I was glad to experience but do not want to experience again.
9. Natural Beauty - Ling Ling Huang #
4☆ - Entertaining, but weak climax #
Summary: A former pianist begins a new job at a beauty store to compensate for her parent’s care. #
Criticism about consumerism and capitalistic beauty standards. I had to reread the climax scene because it confused me since it lacked the sufficient descriptions for me to form an image of what was really happening in my opinion. This happened not once or twice, sometimes I have to reread because the next chapter would change settings without prefacing where they were which made me have to infer. I guess it’s the writing style, since I’ve been reading lots of literature with verbose descriptions.
10. The Employees - Olga Ravn #
4☆ - Genuinely beautiful transhumanist fictions #
Summary: A series of confessions of an intergalactic space crew, where not all of them are born human, contemplating on what makes humanity. #
Transhumanist Anne de Marcken. Enjoyable read, although I understand it was too vague for some readers. The plot is unclear, it was more of a series of meditations where you understand things are happening in the background.