Books read in 2023
31 December 2023 15:10![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kmusserI know I've kind of fallen off of the blogging bandwagon, but I can keep up with these. Book I read in 2023:
Light From Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki - there are two stories here, one about a transgender violin prodigy with a demonic tutor and one about aliens trying to find a life on Earth and both are fascinating, only problem is that they don't gel very well. I feel they might have been better served by each having their own book, but still a very good read and probably the best of this list.
Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr - a story about the perseverance of stories that does a lot of jumping around in time which I think detracts from the story more than adds, I found it very difficult to follow. There's potential here, but I kind of wish each time period was told as its own short story rather than all the jumping back and forth. In some ways a similar concept to Cloud Atlas which I think does a much better job of storytelling.
The Uninhibited by Dan Morgan - written in 1957, this story about aliens suppressing human telepathic abilities and then the alien mission falling apart because of infighting stands up pretty well, fun read.
Wilderness Tips by Margaret Atwood - a collection of short stories, mostly slice of life type stories about growing up in 60's Ontario, loosely tied together by the characters attending the same summer camp. Decent read, but not especially memorable, lighter fare than her novels tend to be.
Circe by Madeline Miller - a retelling of Odysseus from Circe's point of view, very well done and especially fun if you know your Greek mythology. Recommended.
Planet of Whispers by James P. Kelly - weird sci-fi/fantasy about cat people in conflict with some aliens where the fact that they're cat people makes no impact on the story and the plot is sort of a generic fantasy quest type thing. Meh.
Brother Robert by Annye Anderson - non-fiction about bluesman Robert Johnson told by his half-sister. First part is mostly biographic and besides being about Johnson is a remarkable portrait of what it was like for an African-American family in the 20's and then the end of the book goes into how the family lost control of Johnson's music and legacy, swindled by White biographers. Recommended even if you aren't into blues music.
Barsoom Project by Larry Niven and Steven Barnes - this has not aged well, a mystery set in a VR game, the book is marred by this weird obsession with weight and pervaded by fat phobia. What I did find interesting though is the description of the game itself which is sort of a LARP/VR/Escape room type thing and sounds remarkably like what Disney was trying to do with Galactic Starcruiser 30 years after this was written.
Cavalier in Buckskin by Robert Utley - a biography of General Custer that I think fairly even handed. Most stories of Custer paint him as either hero or villain, but really he's a much more bizarre character than that. Worth the read if interested in Civil War or American West history.
Venus Throwing by Steven Saylor - part of Saylor's Roman mystery series, was meh. I enjoyed the historical fiction aspects, but the setup for the actual mystery had the lead act out of character and the whole mystery plot seemed kind of forced.
Legend of Korra: Turf Wars by Michael Dante MiMartino - the first graphic novel collection that is a sequel to the animated series, this picks up right were the series ends and deals with the aftermath. Enjoyed the story, definitely keeps the same spirit as the series and the artwork is simply stunning.
A Treasury of Great Science Fiction, Volume 1 by Anthony Boucher - an anthology of stories ranging from 1938 to 1958 and a nice mix in types of stories and for the most part all stuff that has aged pretty well, better than a lot of sci-fi from the 60's. Includes two novels, the first and best, Re-birth (aka The Chrysalids) by John Wyndham is a post apocalypse story of a society of fundamentalists that exile or kill anyone with any sign of mutation and a group of telepaths trying to figure out a plan of survival before they're found out - reading it I think it felt very Atwood-like, and now I'm seeing it was indeed one of the inspirations for Handmaid's Tale. The second novel, The Weapon Shops of Isher by A.E. von Vogt I didn't care for as much. I've found my tolerance for libertarian BS has grown very thin, and it has a fair amount of it, about a series of weapons shops that transcend time and space and safeguard society. The short stories were a mixed bag, I think my favorite was The [Widget], The [Wadget], and Boff by Theodore Sturgeon where a couple of aliens run a boarding house to observe humans and interfere to awaken their human subjects latent sense of empathy. Also notable was Waldo, an early Heinlein story, which I didn't think the story anything special, but was impressed by it's prescient descriptions of things like wireless energy transmission and the tools for remote manipulation that are now named for the story and a protagonist that I'd assume was based on Stephen Hawking had he been born yet. Volume 2 is up for my first book of 2024.
Light From Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki - there are two stories here, one about a transgender violin prodigy with a demonic tutor and one about aliens trying to find a life on Earth and both are fascinating, only problem is that they don't gel very well. I feel they might have been better served by each having their own book, but still a very good read and probably the best of this list.
Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr - a story about the perseverance of stories that does a lot of jumping around in time which I think detracts from the story more than adds, I found it very difficult to follow. There's potential here, but I kind of wish each time period was told as its own short story rather than all the jumping back and forth. In some ways a similar concept to Cloud Atlas which I think does a much better job of storytelling.
The Uninhibited by Dan Morgan - written in 1957, this story about aliens suppressing human telepathic abilities and then the alien mission falling apart because of infighting stands up pretty well, fun read.
Wilderness Tips by Margaret Atwood - a collection of short stories, mostly slice of life type stories about growing up in 60's Ontario, loosely tied together by the characters attending the same summer camp. Decent read, but not especially memorable, lighter fare than her novels tend to be.
Circe by Madeline Miller - a retelling of Odysseus from Circe's point of view, very well done and especially fun if you know your Greek mythology. Recommended.
Planet of Whispers by James P. Kelly - weird sci-fi/fantasy about cat people in conflict with some aliens where the fact that they're cat people makes no impact on the story and the plot is sort of a generic fantasy quest type thing. Meh.
Brother Robert by Annye Anderson - non-fiction about bluesman Robert Johnson told by his half-sister. First part is mostly biographic and besides being about Johnson is a remarkable portrait of what it was like for an African-American family in the 20's and then the end of the book goes into how the family lost control of Johnson's music and legacy, swindled by White biographers. Recommended even if you aren't into blues music.
Barsoom Project by Larry Niven and Steven Barnes - this has not aged well, a mystery set in a VR game, the book is marred by this weird obsession with weight and pervaded by fat phobia. What I did find interesting though is the description of the game itself which is sort of a LARP/VR/Escape room type thing and sounds remarkably like what Disney was trying to do with Galactic Starcruiser 30 years after this was written.
Cavalier in Buckskin by Robert Utley - a biography of General Custer that I think fairly even handed. Most stories of Custer paint him as either hero or villain, but really he's a much more bizarre character than that. Worth the read if interested in Civil War or American West history.
Venus Throwing by Steven Saylor - part of Saylor's Roman mystery series, was meh. I enjoyed the historical fiction aspects, but the setup for the actual mystery had the lead act out of character and the whole mystery plot seemed kind of forced.
Legend of Korra: Turf Wars by Michael Dante MiMartino - the first graphic novel collection that is a sequel to the animated series, this picks up right were the series ends and deals with the aftermath. Enjoyed the story, definitely keeps the same spirit as the series and the artwork is simply stunning.
A Treasury of Great Science Fiction, Volume 1 by Anthony Boucher - an anthology of stories ranging from 1938 to 1958 and a nice mix in types of stories and for the most part all stuff that has aged pretty well, better than a lot of sci-fi from the 60's. Includes two novels, the first and best, Re-birth (aka The Chrysalids) by John Wyndham is a post apocalypse story of a society of fundamentalists that exile or kill anyone with any sign of mutation and a group of telepaths trying to figure out a plan of survival before they're found out - reading it I think it felt very Atwood-like, and now I'm seeing it was indeed one of the inspirations for Handmaid's Tale. The second novel, The Weapon Shops of Isher by A.E. von Vogt I didn't care for as much. I've found my tolerance for libertarian BS has grown very thin, and it has a fair amount of it, about a series of weapons shops that transcend time and space and safeguard society. The short stories were a mixed bag, I think my favorite was The [Widget], The [Wadget], and Boff by Theodore Sturgeon where a couple of aliens run a boarding house to observe humans and interfere to awaken their human subjects latent sense of empathy. Also notable was Waldo, an early Heinlein story, which I didn't think the story anything special, but was impressed by it's prescient descriptions of things like wireless energy transmission and the tools for remote manipulation that are now named for the story and a protagonist that I'd assume was based on Stephen Hawking had he been born yet. Volume 2 is up for my first book of 2024.