Nollaig

#48 Sleeping Giants - Sylvain Neuvel Genre: Sci-Fi/Interview Synopsis: A girl named Rose is riding her new bike near her home in Deadwood, South Dakota, when she falls through the earth. She wakes up at the bottom of a square hole, its walls glowing with intricate carvings. But the firemen who come to save her peer down upon something even stranger: a little girl in the palm of a giant metal hand. Seventeen years later, the mystery of the bizarre artifact remains unsolved—its origins, architects, and purpose unknown. Rose Franklin is now a highly trained physicist leading a top secret team to crack the hand’s code. And along with her colleagues, she is being interviewed by a nameless interrogator whose power and purview are as enigmatic as the provenance of the relic. What’s clear is that Rose and her compatriots are on the edge of unraveling history’s most perplexing discovery. But once the pieces of the puzzle are in place, will the result prove to be an instrument of lasting peace or a weapon of mass destruction? *** Review: Hmmm. Some things I really liked about this, and others I didn't like so much, averaging out to an okay reading experience. I'd been waiting for this to come out ever since noticing it on Goodreads, because the premise sounded really interesting, and I was curious to see how the author might make this book stand out from others. Honestly, it doesn't stand out much at all. Maybe the overall combination of elements - one part World War Z, one part War of the Worlds, one part Any Japanese Anime With Mechs, is a unique combination, but overall it felt like the plot for a mediocre anime series. There were definitely aspects of the novel I liked - despite the interview format, something which has kept me from reading World War Z for years, it was pretty easy to tear through, so the writing was obviously somewhat engaging. As well as that, there is one element of the plot which, while brought about in a very forced way, is also both grim and awesome. Maybe not so awesome for the character involved, but it was probably the most interesting aspect of the book for me. Beyond that.... I had no interest in the global politics. I felt the explanation for the title characters was really poor and uninteresting. And the interview format, which contained virtually no other documentation beyond interviews, did nothing but frustate me by hindering my experience of the events in the book by feeding them to me second hand instead of letting me experience them for myself. The more I think about the book, the more I feel my enjoyment stemmed from how easy it was to read, as opposed to there being anything of any great substance here. I am however intrigued enough by the ending to read the second installment when it arrives. Rating: ★★✰✰✰ (It was okay)

The tl;dr version is I wanted to love it, I initially loved it, and then it just went way too arthouse for me. It went almost metaphorical towards the end, and I wished it had stayed more grounded.

Oooh I'd heard about the Josh Sundquist one ages back and then forgotten about it - must put it on my wishlist. Sounds entertaining, doesn't it? Hope you enjoy all your new books

Sorry to hear you're not feeling great, hope you fee better soon. And find more 4 and 5 star books!

I FOUND IT! It's a review I posted on my blog, but forgot to transfer over here. It was actually like #43, but now it is #47! Then, Hex, Girl and Sleeping Giants will bring me up to 50. Lo and behold, the missing 5-star review. #47 The Thing Itself - Adam Roberts Genre: Sci-Fi/Thriller/Philosophy Synopsis: Adam Roberts turns his attention to answering the Fermi Paradox with a taut and claustrophobic tale that echoes John Carpenters' The Thing. Two men while away the days in an Antarctic research station. Tensions between them build as they argue over a love-letter one of them has received. One is practical and open. The other surly, superior and obsessed with reading one book - by the philosopher Kant. As a storm brews and they lose contact with the outside world they debate Kant, reality and the emptiness of the universe. The come to hate each other, and they learn that they are not alone. *** Review: This book was not at all what I expected, and while the 5 stars I'm giving it are somewhat tacit, I do feel they are deserved. This is another novel, a little like Radiance in structure, where you have to take the relevance of some seemingly irrelevant sections on faith, until everything comes together in the end. Admittedly, I didn't get quite what I was expecting given the cover and opening (and I know this is something other readers felt 'misled' by), but once you know not to come into it expecting an Artic-based horror, then you should be okay. The writing is great - multiple narratives spanning centuries are represented by distinct voices whose stories are interesting and almost work as short stories in their own right, but they mostly do not outstay their welcome in the bigger picture of the central plot. There are some really creative threads woven through these smaller stories - I particularly liked the one set in a futuristic utopian society, although one of the ones set in the past was a little bit too long for my liking. This is essentially a sci-fi thriller based off a philosophical idea (or two), and as I studied Philosophy during my undergraduate degree, this book brought back some familiar ideas and ran rampant with them in a genuinely compelling, fast-paced thriller. It's possible that I found it a little easier to digest for having heard the theories before, but I found the philosophical explanations to be very clear (if not a tad repetitive at times), so i'd like to think this book is pretty accessible to anyone willing to sit down and give their brain cells a bit of a work out. My only real qualm is the ending is a tiny bit open ended, and for all the discussion that occurs throughout this book, it would have been nice for it to be a little more pinned down. All the same, thoroughly enjoyed it, and it's one I'll return to sooner rather than later. Rating: ★★★★★ (It was amazing)

I'm not sure it does, I knew I skipped the Deadpool books because I didn't want to review comics, but if everything else is accounted for with those extra three reviews to come, that adds up to review #49. And I've read 50 books. It is definitely possible that I mis-numbered somewhere else, though! Thanks for having a look Willoyd

Admittedly, gender, gender roles and traditional gender stereotypes are not something I really notice much in classic or contemporary literature. I've rarely read any book or watched any film and though about whether there were strong or weak female characters, and I've read a lot of feminist responses to the empowerment of females in The Bloody Chamber etc, but as it's not something I tend to really pick up on I think there's a really significant layer that just went totally over my head.

I loved the first and didn't like the second either! I've occasionally thought about trying again but I probably won't.

Should I take the former off my Goodreads wishlist again? Hope you enjoy Fellside, some very mixed reviews of it out there.

That is gross but also utterly bizzare, why would anyone do that?!

Fluffy white clouds everywhere but blue sky too. Not too warm thankfully.

Yeah, a lot of books are getting 3 stars this year, and I'm starting to think maybe that's more me than the books, I'm not sure... Yep. I even went through all my reviews, but I post them out of order, so say my #26 review is not actually the 26th book I read. Argh. Think I'm gonna need good ole pen and paper for this!

Glad you enjoyed The Bloody Chamber. Recently read it myself and was really underwhelmed - I agree the writing was absolutely stunning, but I found some of the stories awfully repetitive or dull. Wolves everywhere. The Beauty and the Beast one had less depth than the Disney movie, I thought! I can be a bit of a cretin when it comes to good literature though, so I'm likely wrong!

I'm not sure City will be my kind of thing, but I'm intrigued enough to stick it on the wishlist!

I had a fairly good weekend. Caught up with some friends, had one friend down for the weekend so I was pretty tired by Sunday evening when he left. Took yesterday off, and played the 3DS my friend loaned me hehe. I have had a feeling of something being stuck in my throat since Sunday, it's very annoying. Less painful/problematic today, so hoping it's just that I hurt my throat a bit and it feels like there's something, rather than that there actually is something. Giving it another few days anyway to see.

I need to try take part in the upcoming read-a-thon, to work back up a bit of leeway with my schedule!

I haven't read in a few days because I had a pretty busy weekend, but I spent a while last night finding new things to read and read the first few pages of The Loney by Andrew Michael Hurley. Still have to finish Sister.

I can't account for all my books, it's cracking me up! I've read 50 books, but I can only count up to 49 with reviews and ones I've opted not to review. Argh, where's the missing book?!

#46 The Missing - C. L. Taylor Genre: Mystery/Thriller Synopsis: You love your family. They make you feel safe. You trust them. Or do you…? When fifteen-year-old Billy Wilkinson goes missing in the middle of the night, his mother, Claire Wilkinson, blames herself. She's not the only one. There isn't a single member of Billy's family that doesn't feel guilty. But the Wilkinson’s are so used to keeping secrets from one another that it isn't until six months later, after an appeal for information goes horribly wrong, that the truth begins to surface. Claire is sure of two things – that Billy is still alive and that her friends and family had nothing to do with his disappearance. A mother's instinct is never wrong. Or is it? *** Review: This was a pretty enjoyable, easy to read and (for me, although that's not saying much!) unpredictable thriller. Initially I had rated it four stars, but upon reflection it hasn't really stuck with me sufficiently to warrant that rating, so I'm knocking it down to three. All the same, it is absolutely perfect if want you want is an easy thriller to blaze through in an afternoon or evening, and I definitely want to check out more by this author. The characters in the book are pretty likeable for the most part, but I did feel they suffered a little from the paranoia found in The Ice Twins - a family who thought they knew each other breaking apart due to the loss of a child and suddenly nobody knows who to trust in the family. That said, this book is infinitely better than The Ice Twins, so if you're stuck between the two, pick this one. Seriously. The only thing that causes a real mystery here is the blackouts the main character, Claire, has. These make her an unreliable narrator who knows as little as the reader about both her own actions and what is going on around her. It also makes the book pretty compelling - more so than wanting to know what happened to Billy, I wanted to know why Claire was having these blackouts and why she was doing the inexplicable things she was doing. I found the ending very underwhelming though, and I think that might have been the deciding factor in my decision to knock it down to three stars. It's grand, but nothing amazing. Rating: ★★★✰✰ (I liked it)

#45 The Dumb House - John Burnside Genre: Dark Fiction/Horror Synopsis: In Persian myth, it is said that Akbar the Great once built a palace which he filled with newborn children, attended only by mutes, in order to learn whether language is innate or acquired. As the year passed and the children grew into their silent and difficult world, this palace became known as the Gang Mahal, or Dumb House. In his first novel, John Burnside explores the possibilities inherent in a modern-day repetition of Akbar`s investigations. The unnamed narrator creates a twisted varient of the Dumb House, finally using infant twins as subjects in a bizarre experiment. *** Review: Well this was.... bizzare. I love a good, really dark story that is psychologically messed up (I don't know what that says about me but let's not dwell on it!) and this book definitely met both of those criteria but... I just don't get it. I don't get why people think its such a magnificent novel. I didn't *not* like it - the writing is absolutely fantastic (and I plan to read more by Burnside based on this alone) but the plot never really grabbed me. While I was fasincated enough by the idea to want to finish it - and it was easy to finish because of the writing - I came away feeling unaffected. It's a pretty bleak, graphic novel in places, depiciting both animal and human abuse, and while those parts were naturally unsettling, I couldn't relate to the bigger picture. Our narrator remains nameless until the end, though we come to know him quite well through his descriptions of adult and childhood life, and I just never really related to him or his goals. I know nothing about language, so my enjoyment of the novel may have been handicapped by ignorance, but to me language and communication are two distinct things - the former rising from the latter, and while I don't think any one language is innate, the desire to communicate is and therefore will give rise to some form of language. None of what I just said is ever mentioned in the book - it is only referred to as 'seeking to determine if language is innate'. Granted, our narrator is very disturbed, so maybe I shouldn't be surprised. The other thing I think which may have affected my enjoyment is that the Goodreads synopsis tells you THE ENTIRE PLOT. I have modified the synopsis on this review to lessen spoilers, but I would still be inclined to let potential readers know that the bizzare experiment with the twins only occurs towards the very end of the book - it is not the focus, as I thought going in. I was pretty disappointed by that, as I was expecting much more of a straight up horror. Rather than being any kind of horror, this is much more an insight of one guy's twisted mind and life. Enjoyed the writing, but fairly indifferent. Rating: ★★★✰✰ (I liked it)

#44 The Quality of Silence - Rosamund Lupton Genre: Fiction/Mystery/Thriller Synopsis: On 24th November Yasmin and her deaf daughter Ruby arrived in Alaska. Within hours they were driving alone across a frozen wilderness. Where nothing grows. Where no one lives. Where tears freeze. And night will last for another 54 days. They are looking for Ruby's father. Travelling deeper into a silent land. They still cannot find him. And someone is watching them in the dark. *** Review: There was a lot I really liked about this book. Being me, and a fan of the cold, I loved the setting, and I also thought the premise was great. In fairness, to be able to spend an entire novel describing cold, snow, and darkness without being repetitive requires talent. The writing was engaging, enjoyable to read and I tore through it fairly quickly because I was dying to find out what happened in the end - which means the mystery behind Ruby's father's disappearance was compelling. All of these are signs of a good book, but unfortunately a poor ending can really let down any good writing that has gone before, and that is definitely what happened to me with this book. There was too much explaining, which is not something you want towards the end of a book - you want the pieces that have been building up all along to fall into place. The main characters were mostly likeable, even if Yasmin made some seriously questionable decisions. You're stuck with just Yasmin and Ruby for a significant portion of the book, so it's pretty important that you don't hate them. Ruby is impossible not to like - she's intelligent, sweet, and her unique view of the world is captivating. I loved the inclusion of her tweets, but did feel they were too few and too sporadic to really any anything to the book. The villians I really didn't care for at all, and their intentions fed into what I felt was a convoluted ending thrown on the reader at the last minute. I've swung back and forth between three and four stars on this novel. Initially I thought three, then I thought four, and now I'm back to three. The reason is I'm mentally comparing it with other books I've read recently and and am rating it relatively, which is not something I want to do. Objectively speaking, I think good writing versus mostly unengaging characters and a real let-down of an ending means I have to only give it three. Rating: ★★★✰✰ (I liked it)

Yes! I'll be writing a review soon

32 new books Enjoy! I've read a couple Chevaliers and enjoyed them, though I have to admit they didn't stick with me. Might go back and read one or two, coz it's been a few years.

Five, not including ones I've decided I'm not going to bother doing. And there's one I said here I wasn't going to do but did, so I've 6 to post here!

Glad you enjoyed Cuckoo Song! I liked it a lot, but I don't tend to like 'faerie' stories, so it probably wasn't overly suited to me. There was a quote near the end about religion/faith that I loved, can't remember it now. Something to do with church bells? Argh. Why didn't I write it down.