Source: Libby

Ever by Gail Carson Levine

Posted December 16, 2019 in Reviews // 2 Comments

This book was deliciously unexpected. I’ve had mixed experience with Gail Carson Levine – growing up, I remembered reading Ella Enchanted and disliking it (although an adult reread inspired me to reform my opinion) and as such, I didn’t really seek out her books the way may others did. Somehow, I never put together that one of my childhood favorites – The Two Princesses of Bamarre – was also written by her. So by all rights, Ever is a book I should have read many years ago, because I would have loved it. And as an adult, I did love it. The writing […]

Watership Down by Richard Adams

Posted December 13, 2019 in Reviews // 2 Comments

Watership Down is one of those books that was required reading in high school, and thus has a bit of stigma attached to it for that reason alone. I’ve been thinking about rereading it for a time – for me, this was Freshman English in 2003, half my lifetime ago! I didn’t remember much about it other than a lot of discussions about allegory and metaphors, and Richard Adam’s supposed conversations about politics and society within the rabbit communities. All that made me chuckle, because re-reading it, it opened with a note from Adams about how Watership Down came about, and […]

Antigoddess by Kendare Blake

Posted December 12, 2019 in Reviews // 2 Comments

I had a lot of hopes for this book, especially with the way it started out. I really liked the atmosphere at the beginning, and I remember feeling similarly about Anna Dressed in Blood at the beginning as well, but like her other novel, Antigoddess is a lot of conversation and cheesy love story, and less excellent aesthetics. The beginning, like I said, is great. We start in a desert with Athena and Hermes, searching for Demeter. We know that the gods are dying, each in their own way. It’s creative and the atmosphere is spot on. It’s slow moving, […]

Half Bad by Sally Green

Posted December 10, 2019 in Reviews // 0 Comments

I’ve heard a lot of good things about Half Bad and Sally Green’s writing in general, but if I’m being perfectly honest, this novel was a bit of a struggle for me. The world she was building, and Nathan’s story itself – all that was fine and lovely and well built and fascinating. It’s not the story I struggle with, but the speed of the story. The format of this story is steady, but slow. It started well, in the. Idle of Nathan’s captivity, but then we go full stop and rewind to Nathan’s early childhood and work our […]

The Girl Who Saved the King of Sweden by Jonas Jonasson

Posted December 4, 2019 in Reviews // 0 Comments

So, this book is fun and quirky and has a lot of diversity and fun characters. It’s even a bit memorable in its way, so I’d have to say that… generally? I liked it! There are a lot of good talking points in The Girl Who Saved the King of Sweden. First of all, there is the voice it’s told in: the voice has that dry, fun wit that I relate to a lot of British science fiction writers. I really like that voice, because it catches me by surprise and makes me laugh with its subtlety and pointing out […]