Music Monday is a meme created by Drew the Tattooed Book Geek, and I never participated before, but now I want to use it as an excuse and start my follow-up post with a song that is very important to me:
Ada Hoffmann, The Fallen (2021)
Author: Ada Hoffmann
Title: The Fallen
Format: E-book
Pages: 400
Series: The Outside #2
I wanted to read something by Ada Hoffman for a while, as her books have been praised as both a good representation of neurodivergence and as solidly written stories. So when I saw this at NG I jumped at the opportunity, especially because the blurb was promising some cool hard SF, AI elevated to godhood, and a brewing human revolution on a distant planet. Not once had it mentioned that it’s a sequel ;). My bad, I guess, I should have checked the specs on other websites – though to be fair, I think this is one of the sequels where I’m better off not having read the first installment; the sequel explains all the previous events in detail.
Continue reading “Ada Hoffmann, The Fallen (2021)”Stephen Fry, Troy (2021)
Author: Stephen Fry
Title: Troy
Format: E-book
Pages: 432
Series: Stephen Fry’s Great Mythology #3
Hmmm, where should I start this review?
I really like and admire Stephen Fry, his dry humor and his wonderful acting abilities. The audiobooks narrated by him are among the best I ever listened to. His love for Greek mythology is widely known, and he certainly has a respectable amount of knowledge about it. Moreover, he has the uncanny ability to make it accessible and relatable to a modern, not classically educated reader.
And herein lies the problem ;). I gradually discover (yeah, I can be a slow learner ;)) that I do not like retellings of the mythologies I love. Nope. Just nope. I catch myself questioning the author’s decisions about including or omitting stuff, about structuring the narrative, and so on. Worse, I disagree with interpretation ;). So really, I don’t know why I’m even doing this to myself! But when I noticed Fry’s Troy on NG, I just had to check it out to see if it would be a good book for younger readers – and for me 😉
Continue reading “Stephen Fry, Troy (2021)”
Just some personal stuff…
Ok, Ola has spilled the beans, so l decided to write a few words about a big event that is taking place this very Saturday. Friends of the blog should not be surprised, I did start referring to my muggle girlfriend as fiancée last year, and I’m a serious guy – I proposed with every intention of actually getting married 😉 Now, and it’s still a bit difficult to believe in, it’s going to happen and so very soon!
The pandemic situation in Poland isn’t bad right now, with less than a hundred new cases daily and most restrictions lifted. Everyone who wanted to get vaccinated – had a chance to do so. There are troubles ahead, as we have a lot of anti-vaxxers and Delta variant is already here. Still, we have time enough for our wedding and a short honeymoon on Santorini 🙂
We had our stag/hen nights, and both were glorious, big thanks once again to all the people involved – and some of them are actually reading Re-E occasionally… I got a genuine sword (made recently, but to medieval specs, a heavy, 1.5 hand piece). Perfect gift, something I craved but would never buy myself!
Continue reading “Just some personal stuff…”Frank Herbert, Dune (1965)
Author: Frank Herbert
Title: Dune
Format: Paperback
Pages: 528
Series: Dune #1
Everything’s been written about Dune many times over, so forgive me if my review will be somewhat off beat this time. I don’t feel the need to detail the plot or the worldbuilding.
Dune is unequivocally a masterwork of SF, a SF at its best, openly acknowledging its ties to myths and the belief in universal truths of human cognition. But Dune also reaches way beyond SF, having become one of the few absolutely crucial works of fiction of the 20th century. And yet, and yet, while I admire it with passion, it’s a book I cannot love. It leaves me cold and uncaring. It leaves me wanting to pick it apart, and dirty my hands in its bloody insides, and emerge holding the offending element in my palms, triumphant in finding what fault exactly makes me less than welcoming toward it.
But the truth is, I suspect I know it already.
Nice opening, huh? So now I’m going to subvert your expectations, and launch into a lengthy consideration of the socio-ecological ramifications of Herbert’s universe. Kidding!
Though not entirely.
Continue reading “Frank Herbert, Dune (1965)”