catlion27's reviews
245 reviews

Exiles: The Church in the Shadow of Empire by Preston M. Sprinkle

challenging informative inspiring reflective medium-paced

4.75

Really excellent. Sprinkle thoroughly examines the Scriptures and how Israelites and Christians have engaged with politics and empires, and then asks some good questions about how Christians now might use that knowledge in their own contexts. The focus is always on Jesus as King, and I especially appreciated that even as he highlighted the political dimensions of various biblical texts, he didn’t neglect the spiritual dimensions (the way I think books like Jesus for President do). 

There were a couple spots that I thought were a stretch or could've used more explanation, but on the whole I loved the book. I have felt increasingly uncomfortable with the left-right political binary in the US, so it was gratifying to have someone recognize that, call it out, and offer ways that Christians might engage with that reality. 

This book has also challenged me and galvanized me to look for more ways to be distinctively Christian in my local contexts, and to look for concrete ways to serve my neighbor in order to create the kind of polis the Bible calls the Church to be, even as exiles. Highly recommend.

Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart: And Other Stories by GennaRose Nethercott

dark mysterious reflective medium-paced

4.5

Beautifully strange and rich stories about love, death, longing, and hunger. Definitely recommend. I don't know that I have a standout favorite, but the themes were so tightly woven through all the stories that they felt "connected" despite not  having narrative connections to each other. 

The prose is excellent. You can tell Nethercott is a poet, but its poetry doesn't make it hard to read; instead it draws you in. The stories are all very *visceral*. I appreciate how tangibly she deals with bodies, and the way she takes metaphorical or abstract concepts, and spins out a "what if" that grounds them in the real, physical world. There were a few stories that finished with too open of an ending for me, but that didn't detract from the vibes, which I really loved.

I would not call these stories horror but a dark magical realism - they are typically set in a normal setting with some element of the uncanny, the darkness of which varies. 

I enjoyed the format of A Diviner's Abecedarian and Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart because the "story" is peaking out through the background progressively more and more as the story goes. The style reminds me of some creative nonfiction I've read, and I liked this use of it.  

Cytonic by Brandon Sanderson

adventurous slow-paced

3.75

I wanted to like this book more, but most of it felt a little flat to me. 

I missed the Skwyard Flight folks - it sucks that they haven't been around for two books. 

A lot of Sepnsa's internal monolgue felt clunky. I'm not sure if I would feel that way about Skyward if I read it now, but it made it hard to keep going through. There's also just a lot of descriptions of vague touching-things-with-your-mind that just got old after a while.

 The ending however was good, and the point of

you aren't obligated to give up everything you are for a cause

was a good one. 

The Olympian Affair by Jim Butcher

adventurous medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.5

This was fun! I was really happy to be back after Aeronaut's Windlass, since I loved that so much when I first read it.

There isn't any spice, but there are a number of fade-to-black scenes which are done really well.

There's one plotline in this book that is less interesting/integral which is unfortunate, and it felt a little odd that it was there at times. I think there was just not enough for all the characters to do. But the action was good and exciting, Butcher really knows how to write a good character scene, and there's some unresolved interpersonal tension that I'm glad isn't resolved yet but was handled well. 

There will definitely be a book 3, but this one doesn't end on a huge cliffhanger. There are unresolved plot things but it didn't feel incomplete, which I appreciated. 

The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch

adventurous dark tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

This was very enjoyable! More grimdark than my usual fare (for example, torture and murder, though I did enjoy the shark gladiatorial ring), but it still wasn't too much for my tastes.

The language is colorful in every sense of the word. Lynch has a knack for clever, hilariously crass turns of phrase.

I liked seeing the flashbacks and how the characters met and became close. I hope there are more of those in future books. The scams and plots were clever. I also appreciated that for being a master thief, Locke is *not* OP and gets beaten pretty horribly multiple times. I think it would be easy for a character like him to be a Mary Sue, and he is definitely not. His banter is fun too.

I was pretty annoyed when

Nazca got fridged, horribly

but narratively I don't see a way around it. It was still pretty bad, though.

I had been looking forward to seeing how Nazca and Locke were going to scam her father.

Looking forward to the next book, whenever I get around to it.


 “Someday, Locke Lamora,” he said, “someday, you’re going to fuck up so magnificently, so ambitiously, so overwhelmingly that the sky will light up and the moons will spin and the gods themselves will shit comets with glee. And I just hope I’m still around to see it.”
“Oh please,” said Locke. “It’ll never happen.” 

 

 “There’s no freedom quite like the freedom of being constantly underestimated.” 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Torture, and Violence

Yumi and the Nightmare Painter by Brandon Sanderson

adventurous hopeful slow-paced

4.25

I enjoyed this, particularly by the end, though there were some annoyances that made me not love it. Hoid having to interject with parenthetical asides about crunchy magic physics? Pretty distracting. And I was eh on the whole

groundhog day prison thing going on

. But I enjoyed watching Yumi and Painter learn to trust each other and become closer (though if you're looking for truly romantic scenes, you'll be disappointed). 

The underlying themes of

questioning the religion you were raised in

and

the place of AI in art

came through pretty strongly, and I'm curious to see if they're part of discussions of the book. This was mostly for the better - I think the second one comes across more heavy-handedly than the first, but is still worth talking about. 

Love on the Brain by Ali Hazelwood

lighthearted

4.5

 "The moral of the story is that engineers are not all bad. But the ones I'm attempting to collaborate with are often stabbable." 

The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Loveable characters? Yes

4.5

Really cute and fun. I love the fake dating trope so this was a delight. I usually prefer dual POV romances, but I thought the author did a good job giving details that make it clear to the reader how the MMC feels, even if the FMC is oblivious. Olive does convince herself of ridiculous conclusions to avoid thinking that Adam is into her, which as a reader had me wanting to shake her....but I also know I would probably do the same dumb mental gymnastics. Hypocrisy, thy name is...me. 

I enjoyed this a lot!

The Game Master's Handbook of Proactive Roleplaying: Guidelines and Strategies for Running PC-driven Narratives in 5E Adventures by Jonah Fishel, Tristan Fishel

5.0

I'm not a GM, but would highly recommend for GMs. Their main premise is that RPGs work best when centered around well-defined player goals, and that GMs should create factions and NPCs and encounters that directly intersect with player goals in order to create interesting conflict and stories. I'm still not sold that this is the *only* way to play, because I do like more choose-your-own-adventure type stories where the GM has more of a story in mind, but I can see the benefits of having well-defined character goals, and I think GMs can have their cake and eat it to to an extent with this method by taking their own ideas and the character goals beforehand and making sure they will bump up against each other in interesting ways. 

My main outstanding question is if it is possible to have a PC be "dragged" into a story even if they are reluctant, which is something that has happened that I'm not opposed to, and as a player kind of plan for my character to feel compelled to solve a mystery or whatever alongside their main goal of laying low, for example.

Even as a player reading this book, it was helpful to think about getting specific with my characters' goals. The book has lots of helpful brainstorming tables and flowcharts and examples, too.

What the River Knows by Isabel Ibañez

adventurous tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

So I had a lot of fun with most of this book. The romance is particularly well-done and cute. The protagonist is a little frustrating at times in a YA sort of way, but overall she is determined and takes matters into her own hands which is fun to watch. The prose is a little repetitive and overdescriptive at points; for example, Inez will think a metaphor in her head twice, essentially. The magical elements were carefully woven in and not overbearing. There were some good twists. And then there was a bit at the end that really took me out of the vibe of the book:

when Elvira gets murdered. It felt so incredibly out of the blue and unnecessary and just so tonally different from the rest of the fun adventure romance.

. AND THEN the very very end plus the cliffhanger telegram brought me back around...somewhat. Would've been a 4.25 if not for the aforementioned vibe-killing part. I think I will probably read the next book if only for more of Inez and Whit onscreen together.