The continuing cull of the collection…
June 01, 2020
Updating from my May 1st list. The first two entries “graduate” from the triage list to abandoned status. I’ve had no desire to revisit Today I Am Carey and my attention span bounced off What’s For Dinner without making any new progress.
Today I Am Carey, Martin L. Shoemaker, Baen monthly. One chapter (5%) into this story of an empathic android caring for an elderly dementia patient. Not badly written, but I’m still looking for the hook.
What’s For Dinner? , N. Gray. Bookfunnel or some other freebie. According to Goodreads, it’s an anthology about meals and death. Or death as a meal. I’m not sure, and thinking that at 14% through, the main course and I are not going to make it each other.
Midnight Visitors: A Steampunk Cat Novel, Kevin O. McLaughlin. Bundle purchase. Presenting the point of view as that of a cat is interesting. Unfortunately, I’m a dog person. 13% through.
Mechanical Dragons: Fire & Water (Mechanical Dragons #1), Bobbi Schemerhorn. Bundled purchase? This may be more YA than adult. “Simple and clear” is a reasonable description of both the writing style and, less fortunately, the path of the plot and the characters. 15% through.
Frenzy, Glenn Lazar Roberts. This is begging to be turned into a straight-to-Starz streaming feature. The plot and premise aren’t meant to be taken too seriously, but I didn’t find it all that much fun, either. Got to 7%.
The Cloud Roads, Martha Wells. From the author of a series I absolutely loved, this one is having trouble leaving the runway. Strong candidate for a revisit later. Got to 23%.
Fire In The Mind, Arjay Lewis. Gets great Goodreads reviews, but I’m finding the writing a bit flat. The pace so far--6% in--isn’t promising. Perhaps one to come back to but I can’t see reading an 8 book series based on this.
Amena’s Rise to Stardom: Divine Warriors #0, Kristen S. Walker. More of a teen/YA thing, this so far seems like a recasting of Faust for children of the TV age--although perhaps there’s a happier ending when the goddess of the rainforest steps in for Mephistopheles? Got to 18%.
Westward, Ho! (Golden West #1), J.R. Murdock. Airships and Clockwork bundle. I don’t think I’m the target demographic for this one, either. Plucky teenager battles mysterious forces in a Steampunk gold rush. Not bad, but not for me. Made it through 12%.
Tooth and Claw, Jo Walton. This was a May free download from Tor’s website. The author described it as “a sentimental Victorian novel about dragons who eat each other.” And she’s not kidding. Well-written, well-paced, suffers from being Jane Austen meets I don’t know what--Anne McCaffery’s Pern without the dragon riders plus cannibalism…maybe? I’d have raved at a short story or even a novella, but this is 300 pages of an interesting premise and deadly dull period mores. Made it to 28% through.
In triage:
Dhalgren, Samuel R. Delany. This is an esteemed classic, but is also a literary experiment. I am finding it exceptionally tough going. Will revisit this over the next few weeks. (Update: Zapped it on June 7.)
Voices of the Fall (Black Tide Rising #5.5), John Ringo, ed. Zombie anthology. Nothing wrong with this as such, just haven’t been in the mood.
Beyond Frankenstein, Mary Shelley. A Tachyon reissue of an 1831 original. Mary Shelley is an SFF O.G.