Illuminae

 

(Illuminae 1) Illuminae by Amie Kaufman & Jay Kristoff

Audiobook Narrator: Full Cast Listed below Tiltle and Author links to where you may purchase the book. This is a rating primarily of the audiobook although I did read along in much of the ebook.... which isn't exactly easy. It's a visually challenging book.

My Rating:

Highly recommended 5-star science fiction thriller novel. I believe if there were a writer's class strictly for "in media res" it would show this book. Kady is breaking up with Ezra, period! She's escaping school so as to not see him... except the school, well the whole planet is under attack from space, and things are blowing up, and it's an illegal space mining thing more like a planet that is largely ice, as I recall.

Generally: Just try to keep up. Things are happening fast. You don't know anything, everything is confusing but it's okay... you've been there. If you're young you'll recognize it, if your family has fought, you'll recognize it, I made notes about "the fog of war" as it kind of struck me deep and personal at some points.

Thing is, when life does this, and I think it does this to everyone, there's just forward. If that is not what is happening with you when "that" happens or if you don't very quickly decide that's what you are going to be doing right about now... you're out of the game. In a book like this, or in 'the fog of war' you're likely dead.

No joke, survival rate is real low when real life sh.t starts getting tornado/hurricane/earthquake/volcano/war like REAL.

A Memory Called Empire

 

(Teixcalaan 1) A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine

Narrator: Amy Landon, Thank you for your excellent performance.

I pre-reviewed this having finished 70+% of it. I had issues but this novel being a Hugo winner I assumed things would really turn around. Today, less than a week later I'm mildly recommended this 2020 Hugo Award winning novel! A 3.5 star science fiction/thriller/suspense novel.

With this one... what threw me off were two things. My glowing "pre-reviews", which are all scrapped. And reviews which I routinely try to ignore were all glowing with praise, excitement, maybe even some worship. I do try to ignore other reviews, but really, let's be honest. When we grossly disagree, do we really want to stir to pot, so to speak?

The things I wish I did straight up in every review is say, "good/bad" this genre, (fantasy, gnomes & vampires), sci-fi epic expansionists, or so forth. I recommend or not, maybe something I thought cool or that sucked. That way in a sentence or two you can largely make up your mind, if you trust me, to add it to a list or scrap it for later. Then I try to be consistent with babble, but fail miserably.

First thing I messed up on this novel was thinking "Hugos" mean something. I recall thinking J. D. Powers meant something then read some article where they were selling me that McDonald's was the best restaurant in the USA.

Born in Fire by K. F. Breene

(Fire & Ice Trilogy 1) Born in Fire: Ebook: 26 Chapters, 259 pages (Pocketbook Pro app),
Audiobook: 10:24:10 

Audiobook Narrator: Nicole Poole

For spoiler sales blurbs, which I attempt to avoid. Read the sales blurbs at Goodreads, Bookbub, or Amazon Ebook & Amazon Whispersync Audio or your favorite book source

(Fire & Ice Trilogy 1) Born in Fire by K. F. Breene

My Rating:

I recommend you put Ms. Breene on your "To Read" list. I've read at least 10 of her books, many of them twice. I've not found one I would not recommend.

First, thanks Katie for Born In Fire. I haven't laughed so hard since Don Quioxte in 2019.

Generally:
Our protagonist is Reagan. Reagan isn't easy to like at first. She comes off a bit pretentious. No worries. I've learned to trust Ms. Breene.

Reagan is a bounty hunter in New Orleans. She was strutting down Bourbon Street in her black army boots, made for kicking in teeth, black leather pants with gun holstered on her leg, and a sword strapped to her back. A little girl broke away from her parents and ran towards her. She stopped to pick up a string of pink beads on the street. After picking them up she said to Reagan, "Pink's my favorite color."

Reagan stared back at her, struck mute. Then replied, "Mine too." The little girl smiled and ran back toward her parents.

"So is mine?" She thought, "No way!", but worse, "Why wasn't that kid afraid of her?"

A Pivot in Time

Cowards die many times before their death. The valiant never taste of death but once.” —Shakespeare (Julius Caesar, Act II, Scene II)

 

(Alien Artifact 2) A Pivot in Time by Douglas E. Richards

Pivot in time: 9 Parts, 62 chapters 417 pages 13:59:19 total audiobook time.

Audiobook Narrator: Dan Bittner

For spoiler sales blurbs, which I attempt to avoid, or to pick up your copy to enjoy check out Goodreads, Bookbub, or Amazon Ebook, Amazon Whispersync or your favorite book source.

My Rating:  

Highly recommended 4.5 star science fiction/thriller/suspense novel. The story of an "alien artifact" discovered in the earlier novel (Alien Artifact 1) The Enigma Cube and the continuing adventures of the people involved in learning to understand this artifact that continue in this book.

Generally: We start in media res (in the middle of a scene) with Otto Richter, also known as Jim Connolly, waking up, in chains, a prisoner. Fortunately for "Jim" he's fluent in several languages, so when Senator Marcus Dorso starts asking him questions in Latin, he isn't entirely baffled.

No mistake, Jim is baffled and confused. Who wouldn't be after traveling 2000± years into the past from 1971, causing him to black out and luckily not die with his heart disease. An experiment only the great Otto Richter would dare with his near super intellect in his rather imaginative effort to reunite with his granddaughter, Kelly Connolly, who we also know from The Enigma Cube.

Meanwhile, back in 2027, The Chinese and their super advanced technology, along with their iron will, have not given up on obtaining the US "Enigma Cube". The Chinese have found another duplicate of the alien artifact. They intend on capturing the US copy, Kelly Connelly, and Justine Boyd who both appear to understand how it works, so they will have both known cubes and be the exclusive power in the world to wield such a powerful device.

My Notable Notes: These are just notes to remind me what was going on during any given time reading the novel and are not meant to be all-inclusive. I often take no notes.

• Ch 1-32 Otto goes back to Roman Times of Jesus in an attempt to reunite with his own family in a convoluted scheme that should land him in 2027 eventually.
• Meanwhile, our protagonists Kelly and super soldier Justine <spoiler>

Middlegame by Seanan McGuire

I'm writing this review on 7/2/20. I finished reading Middlegame on May 31, 2020. This is relevant with regard to a fairy tale I will mention later.

I picked up this ebook & audiobook after reading an article on the 2020 Hugo award nominee finalists. Middlegame was among them and there-after I read a great deal of praise for Seanan McGuire.

I'd never heard of Seanan McGuire before that article. I read Middlegame. Now I own several Seanan McGuire books & audiobooks.


Lately, when reading, I tend to think, "This reminds me of…"

The Left Hand of Darkness

By Ursula K. Le Guine

Read in 3 session on June 20, 25, & 27, 2020. Recommended.  4.5 stars rounded down.

Charlie Jane Anders’ Afterword comments on the Left Hand of Darkness immediately brings to my mind, Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift.

The one thing I remember so vividly about Gulliver’s Travels is that in addition to it being a travelogue, it was even more a handbook on Governments and political etiquette. 

In so many ways, The Left Hand of Darkness is Gulliver’s Travels... aka "Genly’s Travels."

I think many folks were moved by Le Guin’s “Abisexual” alien humans.  It might have impacted me more had I not been so impacted by Octavia Butler’s “Dawn” decades ago.  That book literally haunted me for decades.  Still does. 

An Invisible Client by Victor Methos

My rating:

Amazon rejected this review as violation of community standards. (Ask them, I'm baffled)

This is a legal suspense drama, a legal thriller with a plot similar to the Erin Brockovich movie. This book does a number of nice things I can tell you about without spoiling a thing.

I particularly liked the frank discussion of law from Mr. Victor Methos. A real life attorney with plenty of experience.

Early in the book Mr. Methos boldly tells the reader some painful truth about our legal system.  It's about the money.  It's almost as refined as insurance actuary tables.

Juries of peers, blind justice, everyone equal…, these are all myths that may have held actual meaning in early USA history -- but today justice is a performance being "play-acted" as if it is run any different from the Chinese Communist Party dictatorship. Maybe Amazon didn't like Mr. Metho's implied clarity about this point?

Mind's Eye by Douglas E. Richards

My rating:

Mind's Eye is the first book in Douglas E. Richards's Nick Hall Series. There are 3 books in the series.

If you asked me about any Douglas E. Richard's book, I would likely just say, "Read it." And that would be a good recommendation two out of three times. He's a superb writer, researches his fantastic/speculative fiction quite well and extrapolates with some exciting ideas.

I think the Nick Hall series is another of this great jobs at speculations and research. He does his normal workmanship like writing that seems suited for an action screenplay most the time. If you asked me on April 19, 2020, if you should read the Nick Hall series, having almost finished Brain Web by that time, it would be an instant yes.

The Daylight War by Peter V. Brett

The Daylight War by Peter V. Brett is a 5 star fantasy novel about people who live during the day and hide by night when demons rise from the core of the Earth.  The back story as to how such a world came to be is barely relevant, so rarely discussed.  The world building is exquisite primarily because the entire “Demon Cycle” series of novels is character based.  This means the world is built by character actions and reactions to the world rather than any imaginative narrative.

The Daylight War is the third book in the “Demon Cycle” series.  So the least and most I can say that isn’t instantly “spoiler” material is that all the primary characters continue to grow into more fantastic characters.

When I first read the book, there was no 4th book in the series.

No one who was following the series back when it was first published will ever forget the conclusion of The Daylight War.

The wait for the next book was barely less painful than standing at the end of a very long line knowing your bladder has already exceeded its capacity.

2019 Conclusion

I failed to write several reviews towards the end of 2019.  I get that way sometimes.

If I did not publish them here I may have published something on View all my Goodread's reviews, or The Library Thing. Sometimes I do that. There is another "sagelyfox" on Wordpress, although less well maintained.

Here are the books I believe I failed to review here:

• Iron Gold (Red Rising Saga, #4) by Brown, Pierce * 
• Code Breakers: Prequel by Barnes, Colin F. *
• Code Breakers: Delta (Code Breakers #4) by Barnes, Colin F. *
• Morning Star (Red Rising Saga, #3) by Brown, Pierce *
• Gamma (Code Breakers #3) by Barnes, Colin F. *
• Beta (Code Breakers #2) by Barnes, Colin F. *
• Alpha (Code Breakers #1) by Barnes, Colin F. *
• The Warrior Queen (The Hundredth Queen, #4) by King, Emily R *
• The Rogue Queen (The Hundredth Queen, #3) by King, Emily R *
• The Fire Queen (The Hundredth Queen, #2) by King, Emily R *

The Painted Man by Peter V. Brett

Penguin Random House:

For hundreds of years the demons have terrorized the night, slowly culling the human herd that shelters behind magical wards—symbols of power whose origins are lost in myth and whose protection is terrifyingly fragile.

The Painted Man (Demon Cycle 1) by Peter V. Brett

Narrator(s):
👍🏻The Warded Man by Pete Bradbury,
👏🏻 The Painted Man Colin Mace

My Rating:

Easily a 5-star book. It’s a character driven fantasy. It’s a story of a boy (Arlen) growing up hard in a world where demons rule the night while humans huddle in fear behind magic barriers called wards that they barely understand.

Events mold young Arlen into the man he becomes. It’s much like a coming of age story as well as a hero’s journey.

Book has everything a fiction lover could want. Mystery, the fantastic, love, unrequited love, suspense, thrills, and of course tragedy that we’d much rather endure in fiction than in real life.

There are multiple protagonists (Leesha, Rojer), and the book follows each of them. At first the demons of the night are clearly the antagonists but where there are humans with different beliefs and values conflict hangs in the air like a thick fog.

From a very young Arlen who acquires a 15 foot tall rock demon “one arm” nemesis, who appears to hate Arlen in particular, we are propelled through the drama of human affairs to heroic events causing a dying town to change their name in honor of the scared and sick humans standing in the night against the onslaught of armies of demons.

Dark Age (Red Rising 5) by Pierce Brown

(Red Rising 5) Dark Age by Pierce Brown

My Rating:

Highly recommended 5 star novel. This is book 5 in the Red Rising Saga, a science fiction saga of social class casts of many colors..., and war. The wars of piddling slaves rebelling against the titan giant leaders, or so it was in the first trilogy.

In my mind, Dark Age is book #2 of the second trilogy of the Red Rising series. Officially Red Rising #5. If you're a fan of Red Rising, you don't need my review. I strongly recommend it to any Science Fiction fans, particularly if you love epic space opera/sagas. In this second trilogy it seems to me that Pierce Brown has abandoned the black and white of the fight between good and evil and has ventured in to the muddy marbled gray and white of reality.

Generally: Since this is the second book into the second trilogy of a complex epic space saga series there is no simple or generally.