Witch King

January 25, 2024booknutgirls Leave a comment

by Martha Wells
First sentence: “Waking was floating to the surface of a soft world of water, not what Kai had expected.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There is violence, and some swearing, including multiple f-bombs. It’s in the Science Fiction/Fantasy section of the bookstore.

If you read the jacket summary of the book, you don’t get a whole lot of information. Kai, a demon, has just woken up from being entombed, to find the government coalition he helped form falling apart. This is all true, but the plot is so much more than that. It’s part mystery: Kai and his friends have to figure out why he (and his witch friend, Ziede) was entombed and where Ziede’s wife, an Immortal Marshall is also missing. It’s partly a telling of colonial conquerors and how Kai helped (almost accidentally) overthrow them. It’s a friendship story, one of trust both made and broken. And it’s an adventure story, as you get to see more of the world that Wells has created.

I’ve only ever read the Murderbot series by Wells, but I trust her writing. She’s an excellent world-builder (I could see some of the same elements that I really enjoyed in the Murderbot books) and I liked the magic system she created. She’s got great characters – both main and secondary – and she knows how to make readers care for them. There are Stakes here, and people could die at any point (well, not Kai, since he’s a demon). It was a really great book, and I appreciated that it stood on its own, while leaving threads open to follow, if she chooses to write more.

I don’t know if I’ll go back and read some of her older books, but I quite enjoyed this one.

BookNut’s 20th Anniversary: The First Posts

January 20, 2024booknutgirls 3 Comments

I realized this past week that I’ve been blogging here at The Book Nut for 20 years come this November. I haven’t celebrated my blogiversary in years, and honestly I don’t know if anyone even reads blogs anymore, but I think 20 is something to celebrate.

I’m not entirely sure what I want to do to celebrate, but I thought it’d be interesting to go back and look at my first few posts and see what I thought about them, 20 years on.

My first post after the introductory post, was My 10 Most Favorite Youth Fiction Books. First thing thing I realize now is that I didn’t know the terms (or probably the difference between) Middle Grade and Young Adult. Making these lists now, I’d have three: one for MG, one for YA, and one for Graphic Novels (something else I didn’t read 20 years ago).

Let’s look at the books I put on there.
Solid picks, and they’d probably still make an all-time best of post:
The Blue Sword and Hero and the Crown, Robin McKinley
Bridge to Terabithia, Katherine Paterson
The Dark is Rising Series, Susan Cooper
The Giver, Lois Lowry

The most interesting thing about this is, aside from Hero and the Crown, these are all arguably Middle Grade. Also: they have all stood up to rereading over the years, and are still excellent books/series.

Ones that are good, but probably not my absolute favorites anymore:
The Goose Girl, Shannon Hale – I still adore Shannon Hale, but I think she’s written better books than her first one.
Inkheart, Cornelia Funke – I have fond memories of this one, and I liked the movie (because I pretty much love anything with Brendan Frasier in it), but I haven’t read it in years, so I don’t know if it holds up. I should do a re-read and find out.
The BFG, Roald Dahl – I don’t know what I was thinking: Matilda is a much better book.
Ella Enchanted, Gail Carson Levine – a solid pick, but again: I haven’t read it in years, so I don’t know how it would hold up.

The one I can’t even remember:
Crispin, Avi – It must have bee something I had just finished.

The problematic entry:
The Harry Potter Series, J.K. Rowling – problematic because of the person Rowling has become, but also: I’m not sure these are excellent bastians of children’s literature, anymore. Genre-chaning, sure. Changed publishing, yes. But, excellent books? I’m not sure.

My next list was My 10 Most Favorite Fiction Books. What surprises me most about the list, though, is how balanced it is. Classics! Speculative! Literary Fiction! I was either trying harder to read “good” books and less willing to embrace my love of genre, or I was trying to come up with a balanced list. I wonder if I would do the same if I were doing one of these now. (probably not: I’d be more likely to split it into separate lists.) This list (and the net one tow) is more a portrait of who I was as a person (or who I was trying to be), which is never a bad thing.

Books that would still make a best-of list:
Persuasion, Jane Austen – Still one of Austen’s best, and my personal favorite of hers. (Still has the best love letter ever written.)
I Capture the Castle, Dodie Smith – I don’t know if I’ve reread it in a while, but I do remember really loving it, and I still think it’s an excellent book with one of the best first lines.

Good books, but not my favorite anymore:
A Canticle for Leibowiz, Walter Miller Jr. – An excellent speclative fiction/religious book, and one that I’ve reread, but not one that I would call a favorite anymore.
My Name is Asher Lev, Chaim Potok – Same here. I think it’s an excellent book, but my tastes have changed.
The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien – I’m not surprised this was on my list. I did read it, did enjoy it, love the movies, but I’m not sure my fantasy tates run in this direction anymore. Still a classic, though.
To Say Nothing of the Dog and Doomsday Book, Connie Willis – To be honest, while I remember liking these two, I have no other memory. Maybe it’s time for a reread.
Life of Pi, Yann Martel – I have come to feel like this one is overrated. There are better books out there.

Ones I can’t remember anything about:
So Big, Edna Ferber
The Shepherd of the Hills, Harold Bell Wright

The problematic one:
Speaker for the Dead, Orson Scott Card – Problematic because of the person Card has become over the years, but honestly, I have come to think that Ender’s Game is the better book, and there are better science fiction books out there.

My last list was My 10 Most Favorite Non-Fiction books. The other day at work, we were talking about having classic sections for everything, and I remarked that it’s hard to have classic non-fiction, because information gets outdated so rapidly. Someone joked “how about calling it ‘outdated non-fiction’ then?” I kind of feel that way about putting together an all-time best-of non-fiction (so many hyphens!) list: the information in the books is probably outdated. I think this list is more a reflection of the types of non-fiction I like to read: memoirs, light pop history, foody books, some light science/self help books, travel books, and books about books. While the particular books have changed, my tastes in non-fiction hasn’t, really.

Solid picks, though I’m not sure how well they hold up:
Reading Lolita in Tehran, Azar Nafisi
Seabiscuit, Laura Hillenbrand
Garlic and Sapphires, Ruth Reichl
America’s Women, Gail Collins
Eats, Shoots & Leaves: A No-Tolerance Guide to Punctuation, Lynne Truss

I have no memory of reading any of these:
The Beggar King and the Secret of Happiness, Joel ben Izzy
The Price of Motherhood: Why The Most Important Job is Still the Least Valued, Ann Critteneden
A Trip to the Beach, Melinda and Robert Blanchard
Tales of a Female Nomad, Rita Golden Gelman
Emotional Intelligence, Daniel Goleman

It’s been an interseting trip down memory lane! I’ll probably come up wtih something else to highlight next month.

Funny Story

January 19, 2024booknutgirls 1 Comment

by Emily Henry
First sentence: “Some people are natural storytellers.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
ARC pilfered from the box our awesome Penguin rep sent the store.
Release date: April 23, 2024
Content: There is some swearing, including multiple f-bombs, and on-page sex. It will be in the Romance section of the bookstore.

Daphne has uprooted her life and moved to northern Michigan – a smallish town on Lake Michigan – because her fiance, Peter, wanted to move home. All is fine and good: she has a dream job as a children’s librarian and she’s planning their wedding. Until the night of Peter’s bachelor party, when he decides he can’t live without his best friend and love of his life, Petra. He calls off the wedding, and heartbroken, Daphne turns to the only person she can think of who can understand her heartbreak (and has an empty room): Petra’s ex-boyfriend, Miles.

Their stint as roommates is uneventful until they get invitations to Peter and Petra’s wedding. Then, when they drunkenly RSVP and Peter calls to ask why, Daphne lets out that she and Miles are “dating”. Thus begins the fake dating scheme to get back at Peter and Petra, which might just turn into something more.

Henry is a solid romance writer, and this one is right up there with the best of her work. I think she’s justifying her leap to hardcover: this one is as much about Daphne’s self-discovery and learning to make and cultivate friendships as it is about hitting all the romance tropes. I love that both Daphne and Miles are complicated characters, but that they learn, develop, and grow together in ways that are just delightful. Henry knows how to write banter with the best of them, and even though the characters aren’t enemies, there’s some pretty smart and fun banter going on. And there’s palpable tension coming off the page when they get together.

If Henry decides to publish her grocery list, I’ll read it. She’s just that good. And this one is no exception.

Heartstopper Volume 5

January 17, 2024booknutgirls Leave a comment

by Alice Oseman
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Others in the series: Volume 1, Volume 2, Volume 3, Volume 4
Content: There is a handful of swearing, including a few f-bombs. There is also some fade-to-black sex. It’s in the Graphic Novel section of the bookstore.

It’s the end of Nick’s year 12 and Charlie’s year 11, and they’re starting to think about the Future. Not just the future together – will they or won’t they have sex (spoiler: they do) – but the actual future, since Nick is looking at going away to college.

It’s just the next stage of Nick and Charlie’s relationship – learning how to be individuals in a partnership, and learning how to become their best selves. I liked that there was a lot of communication going on: between Nick and Charlie, yes, but also between the parents and the kids and all the friends. It helps to have a good support system, especially when you, like Charlie, have an eating disorder that you’re trying to manage.

I wish I had read these back to back; although I do love being back with Nick and Charlie, I also find myself a bit disconnected from it all. I’ve had this one sitting on my TBR pile for weeks since it came out, and I wasn’t overeager to read it, like I was when it first came out. From what Oseman said, volume 6 will be the last one, and I can sense the story coming to an end. I have liked these, though, and I appreciate that they exist in the world.

Blood Justice

January 14, 2024booknutgirls Leave a comment

by Terry J. Benton-Walker
First sentence: “Granny was dead, and no one gave a damn — a truth that Velntine Savant choked on for the entirety of her grandparents’ poorly attended joint funeral service.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Release date: April 23, 2024
Others in the series: Blood Debts
Content: There’s a lot of violence and a lot of swearing, including many f-bombs. It will be in the Teen (grades 9+) section of the bookstore.

Spoilers for Blood Debts, obviously.

There’s so much going on in this book it’s going to be hard to sum up. Let’s just say Valentina’s grandparents are dead, and she hates her parents and wants revenge on the Trudeau twins and get her power back, and will do anything to it. Clem has an undead (or mostly alive?) boyfriend that he’s been hiding from the world while he tries to figure out how to more alive him. Cris is Angry at Everything and Everyone and is taking Justice into her own hands. Adults are somewhere in there, but not doing much of anything. And there’s an unhinged evil god lurking around.

I was talking to co-workers about this one and this sentence came out of my mouth: “It’s like Riverdale, but with magic and set in New Orleans.” Honestly, that’s the most accurate description for this train wreck of a book. It’s so very soap-y and twisty and all the 16-year-old are acting like grown adults and like children at the same time. Everyone is always so full of Guilt and Secrets and Plots, it’s ridiculous.

And yet. I finished it. I am invested in this silly, overly dramatic, very Queer soap opera. I do want to know how it ends, though i think Benton-Walker could drag it out as long as he wanted to; much like Riverdale, Something is always happening to put the Teens in Peril. Why does it have to end? I do appreciate Benton-Walker tackling racisim, homophobia, the abuse by cops, and general corruption in politics. It’s a lot to deal with, but it’s a lot of a book, so it fits in well.

I think this one gets filed under: it’s a hot mess of a book and not much fun at all, but it’s compelling, and so it’s worth reading.

Audiobook: The Misfits

January 13, 2024booknutgirls Leave a comment

by Lisa Yee
Read by Cindy Kay
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Or listen at Libro.fm
Content: It’s a fast-paced novel, and there are illustrations in the print version. Some intense moments may be scary to sensitive readers. It’s in the Middle Grade (grades 3-5) section of the bookstore.

Olvie Coben Zang has been an outcast her entire life. Her parents are too busy to pay her much attention, she doesn’t really fit in at school, she has no friends… the works. The only person who really saw her was her grandmother, Mimi, but she has passed on. And then, out of the blue, her parents tell her that she’s being transferred to a boarding school, RASCH, a unique school for unique kids. Once there, she’s lumped in with four other outcasts – James, who’s young but has an encyclopedic knowledge of words and history; Philomena (“just call me Phil”) who is a tech genius; Iggy, who has a bit of temper but a heart of gold; and Theo (TBH, I just thought of him as the White kid). Together, they form the Misfits, as part of an experiment to train kids as spies. Their goal, in the end: Catch the Bling King and get back the infamous, super expensive necklace of the school’s founder.

This was a lot of fun. I liked the mystery (I miscalled the ending!), I liked the characters – they were fun and interesting and sometimes silly. It was well-paced; I could see a kid falling into the book and plowing through it because it’s hard to put down. And Kay, as a narrator, is excellent. She definitely keeps the pace up as well as helping with voices to keep all the numerous characters (including the adults) straight.

I thoroughly enjoyed this and am looking forward to more in the series.

Audiobook: The Six

January 9, 2024booknutgirls Leave a comment

by Loren Gush
Read by Inés del Castillo
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Or listen at Libro.fm
Content: There is some swearing, including a couple of f-bombs. It’s in the History section of the bookstore.

In the late 1970s, NASA changed its policy about including women in the corps; realizing (albeit slowly) that perhaps space travel shouldn’t be an all-boys club. In 1978 they accepted the first six women into the space program: Sally Ride, Judy Resnik, Anna Fisher, Kathy Sullivan, Shannon Lucid, and Rhea Seddon.

If you’re like me, you’ve heard of Sally Ride, the first woman in space, but the rest were relative unknowns. Grush weaves the stories of the six women together – a brief biography of their younger years, but mostly concerning their desires to go into space, and then their later experiences at NASA and eventually flying on the shuttles – seamlessly. The book has enough personal information to make the women feel like real people, not just Trailblazers and Pioneers and all that important stuff (which they were, don’t get me wrong). There was enough technical NASA stuff in the book to make it feel authentic without intimidating someone (like me) who is not STEM-inclined. And there was enough feminist stuff to make the reader realize what these six women were up against and how much they had to push to get the culture around NASA to change.

And del Castillo was a fabulous reader. She kept me engaged in the material and I swear she choked up a bit around the Challenger explosion in 1986. (Yes, that’s in there.) It’s not something I would have normally picked up, but I’m so glad I did.

Hogfather

January 7, 2024booknutgirls Leave a comment

by Terry Pratchett
First sentence: “Everything starts somewhere, although many physicists disagree.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Others in the series: It’s part of the Death cycle in Discworld, but you can read it as a standalone.
Content: It’s Terry Pratchett. Do we really need to discuss content? It’s in the Science Fiction/Fantasy section of the bookstore.

It’s Hogswatchnight, and mostly everything is normal in Ankh-Morpork, with celebrations and everything. Except it’s not okay: the Hogfather has gone missing. And in order to save humanity (just go with it), Death has taken over the Hogfather’s duties. (Albeit very awkwardly.) Once Death’s granddaughter Susan realizes things are not right, she embarks on a journey to find out what happened to Hogfather.

I have been meaning to read this for years. I love it whenever I visit Discworld; Pratchett’s humor and observations hit the spot. I giggle, I cry, I am amused and delighted at the characters. It’s a maze of a book; I was sometimes wondering where the plot was going, but I trust Sir Terry and he did not disappoint. I adored Susan, and in the end, Sir Terry pulled off a remarkably delightful book.

My Best of 2023

December 31, 2023booknutgirls 2 Comments

I joined StoryGraph at the beginning of the year, abandoning Goodreads after who knows how long. (They allowed me to import my data, which made me very happy!). At any rate, one of my favorite features of Storygraph is that they track your data for you! That makes someone like me, who likes to look at the numbers behind my reading, very very happy.

So, the numbers:

Middle Grade: 36
Young Adult: 21
Graphic Novels: 16
Adult Fiction: 45
Non-Fiction: 14
Total: 132

Number of those that were audiobooks: 50

Number that were Speculative fiction (not including graphic novels): 23
Number that were by BIPOC authors: 27 (20%; slightly better than last year, but still not great)
Number by Latine authors: 8
Number I reread: 5
Number I abandoned: too many to count, and I made a conscious decision not to blog about them this year

My moods, according to StoryGraph:

My top 10, not including Middle Grade, which will be revealed tomorrow when the Cybils finalists are announced.

In order, two each of adult fiction, audiobooks, YA, graphic novels, and non-fiction.

And the other fun thing is they track my genres!

My top genre was middle Grade with 39 books, and the bottom two were music (the BTS book) and crime (which tuned out to be really a mystery, but hey, I’m not complaining).I am surprised I read a lot more contempoary than SFF, but maybe I shouldn’t be?

This is kind of turning out to be an ad for StoryGraph, but I’ve really enjoyed it this year.

What were some of your favorietes? Did anything surprise you?