James finished reading Under the Blue by Oana Aristide
Wow, that was the quickest book I've read this year. Compelling and an easy read. Nice message well delivered.
Reviews and Comments
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James finished reading The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin
The Dispossessed: An Ambiguous Utopia is a 1974 utopian science fiction novel by American writer …
Enjoyable narrative that serves an interesting treatise on anarchism and human nature. I started reading it as I thought it would be more about the invention of the ansible, but that was really a side aspect that served as a small part of the motivation of the protagonist. I certainly wanted to stay in the world at the end of the book and gld that there's more books in the series to revisit.
James started reading Ender's Shadow by Orson Scott Card (Shadow Saga)
This is Bean's installment of Orson Scott Card's Ender's saga. It is a great character …
I've read Ender's Game and always considered reading more of the saga. My mother gave me this, and I'm very intrigued by the idea of seeing the events of Ender's Game from another perspective and written by a more developed author in a different time period.
James finished reading This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar
Two time-traveling agents from warring futures, working their way through the past, begin to exchange …
A fine book that got more compelling as it went on. Its full of nice complex ideas that don't seem to get explored.
James finished reading Monkey by Wu, Cheng'en
I knw about Monkey only from the TV show, that I only ever caught glimpses of. I picked up this book as I thought it woudl give an interesting insight into a story that I expected to be ancient and difficult to read as a modern reader. I found this translation to be surprisingly fun and easy to read. The characters are enjoyable and the world feel expansive, but also restricted. The introduction that explains it as partially a satire on Chinese bureaucracy helps you spot and enjoy the humour. After feeling like I was pushing myself through the last few books I read this was a breath of fresh air.
James started reading The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame
The adventures of four amiable animals, Rat, Toad, Mole and Badger, along a river in …
Another in the line of reading all the classic childrens books
James started reading Monkey by Wu, Cheng'en
Have tried to start reading this before but lost interest. Time to give it another go.
James rated The Last Continent: 2 stars
The Last Continent by Terry Pratchett (Discworld, #22)
James finished reading The Last Continent by Terry Pratchett (Discworld, #22)
Content warning General description of characters, no plot points
Not a bad book, but pretty drawn out, kind of wish it was a shorter novel. I'm not sure if the invention of a county that has every cliché about Australia is intentionally bad, or if it's a lack of real understanding. The way Rincewind treats the 'female impersonators' is nice, but the language used by the author seems to but him more on the side of the rest of the characters, who see them as other and poor imitations.
James started reading The Last Continent by Terry Pratchett (Discworld, #22)
The last in the set od Discworld book i bought at the start if the year. I can't say they've impressed me.
James finished reading Interesting Times by Terry Pratchett
Interesting Times is a fantasy novel by British writer Terry Pratchett, the seventeenth book in …
Content warning Small plot point mention
A Discworld book that is filled with outdated prejudices and assumptions about asian cultures. The over arching plot is a development of all the previous Rincewind books. The most interesting element to me was the rebel group that is actually a tool of one part of the establishment to bring down another part of the establishment.
James finished reading Sourcery by Terry Pratchett (Discworld, #5)
When last seen, the singularly inept wizard Rincewind had fallen off the edge of the …
Certainly the best Discworld book Ive read so far. The heavy handed theme of not needing to be who ypu are 'supposed' to be seems to elevate the book beyond 'funny magic happens in a funny world'.
James finished reading The Light Fantastic by Terry Pratchett (Discworld, #2)
The Light Fantastic is a comic fantasy novel by Terry Pratchett, the second of the …
As a person who doesn't read fantasy novels I feel I'm missing out of some of the parody and irony. The book is at the awkward age where the portrayal of women is slightly better and misogyny is acknowlwdged as bad, but there is still some unacceptable things.
James finished reading The colour of magic by Terry Pratchett (Discworld -- 1, #1)
On a world supported on the back of a giant turtle (sex unknown), a gleeful, …
Picked this up intending to read the Discworld series for the first time. Lots of people have told me its one of the less good ones. I thought it was fine, the world is beyond outlandish and the rules of the universe are hard to follow. I can certainly see how reading some meta analysis might make it more fun.
James finished reading The Voyage of The Dawntreader by C. S. Lewis
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader is a high fantasy novel for children by C. …
Enjoyed this more than the prevoous books in the series. Although many of the Pevensies are whingy and too much 'from the past' to be relatable, Reepycheep is great.