laurareads87's reviews
587 reviews

Rootwork by Tracy Cross

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emotional reflective tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.0

 Rootwork is set in 1889 Louisiana, and is written from the perspectives of three sisters – Ann, Betty, and Pee Wee – living in a bayou parish community with their parents and just down the way from their aunty Teddy, a skilled hoodoo practitioner. The novella focuses both on the community and family’s interactions with the local sheriff – a racist misogynist whose abuses are widely known – in the wake of a tragedy, and with the sisters’ introduction to hoodoo and family traditions with aunty Teddy. 
 
There is so much that is fantastic about this novella – the character development is nuanced and thoughtful and each sister feels wholly distinct, the setting comes alive, and I was emotionally invested from the beginning. After finishing Rootwork, I immediately purchased the sequel. I definitely recommend this novella for readers of historical fiction (the first genre listed is ‘horror’ and this doesn’t read like primarily horror to me – there are certainly scary aspects, but it is also a story of family, justice, tradition, and faith). 
 
Content warnings: violence, gun violence, murder, body horror, blood, medical content, racism, racial slurs, grief, death, death of a parent, animal cruelty, animal death, mentions of sexual assault (not on page or graphic) 
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White is for Witching by Helen Oyeyemi

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challenging dark sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? N/A
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes

2.0

This is a hard book to review. There are elements of this that I really liked and think were very effective, and there were other elements that didn’t work so well. 

The multi-POV structure including the POV of not only human characters but also a house was really interesting, but the lack of clarity around each perspective shift was not – having to figure out who was narrating was more irritating than anything. There are a lot of hints and allusions to various possibilities with no concrete confirmations provided, and this is really unsettling (in a good way); however, I’m left feeling at the end like there just wasn’t enough plot to make this work. Conceptually, there is a lot going on (again, in a good way) but as a horror novel, I didn’t find this particularly frightening. 

Oyeyemi’s writing is beautiful, and the whole book feels very eerie and atmospheric. I would 100% read something else by Oyeyemi even though this book didn’t really work for me. 

Content warnings: blood, body horror, injury detail, suicidal thoughts, mental illness, death, death of a parent, disordered eating, racism, xenophobia, animal cruelty 
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Anoka: A Collection of Indigenous Horror by Shane Hawk

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challenging dark reflective tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.0

Anoka is a really solid horror short fiction collection written from an Indigenous perspective. The stories range in length from a few pages / flash to quite a bit longer, and are very diverse thematically. What unites the stories is the setting of Anoka, MN, 'the Halloween capital of the world.' Hawk seamlessly blends horror, mythology, and elements of contemporary Indigenous life throughout his work; some of the stories I found absolutely horrifying, and at one point I did need to make the decision to stop reading so close to bedtime. I appreciate Hawk's inclusion of notes at the end explaining his inspiration and thoughts about each story. Definitely recommend this collection for horror readers, and I'll look forward to reading more from Shane Hawk.

Content warnings: blood, gore, body horror, murder, death, blood, vomit, child death, death of a parent, suicide (mentioned, not on page or graphic in any way), violence, cannibalism, racism, colonialism, spiders/arachnophobia
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The Dead Cat Tail Assassins by P. Djèlí Clark

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adventurous dark funny medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes

5.0

 P. Djèlí Clark is one of my absolute favourite authors writing SFF right now. He consistently delivers amazing characters, fascinating world-building, strong social justice oriented themes, and all around great stories – The Dead Cat Tail Assassins is no exception. 

The novella focuses on Eveen, an undead assassin hired by an anonymous client to kill a target who, when Eveen sees her... is impossible. What follows is an action-packed adventure as Eveen and friends try to figure out where this impossible target came from and the implications of the contract and Eveen’s fulfilling it (or not). How Clark gets this much character development and this level of action in so few pages I don’t know, but the result is so much fun. 

Clark’s representation of women – nuanced & believable queer female protagonists in particular – is something I’m always grateful for. I believe this novella is a standalone but I’d so happily more of Eveen and the Dead Cat Tail Assassins. 

Content warnings: death, gore, violence, injury detail, blood, body horror, animal death 
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Devil in a Blue Dress by Walter Mosley

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adventurous dark tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.0

Devil in a Blue Dress follows Easy Rawlins, an out of work veteran in need of money for his mortgage; when he’s introduced to a stranger looking to pay for information about a white woman’s whereabouts, he feels like he has to take the job... and the mystery begins. 

This is way outside my usual genre comfort zone, but I really enjoyed a lot about it. The character development is really excellent – Easy Rawlins is such a complex, nuanced lead character – and Mosley’s depiction of ‘40s LA feels very real. The plot went in directions I didn’t expect – some very heavy, difficult directions at times - and I didn't want to put the book down once I was invested in Easy's investigation. I will absolutely read more in this series. 

Content warnings: racism, racial slurs, sexism, misogyny, sexual abuse, child abuse, incest, death, blood, murder, police brutality 
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The Year's Best African Speculative Fiction (2023) by Chinaza Eziaghighalaby, Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki

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adventurous challenging funny hopeful mysterious reflective tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes

5.0

 I have thusfar read every volume of The Year’s Best African Speculative Fiction and, like its predecessors, 2023’s collection is excellent. 

I had already previously read and really enjoyed two stories in this collection – Wole Talabi’s, which is also published in his fantastic collection Convergence Problems, and P. Djèlí Clark’s Hugo-nominated “How to Raise a Kraken in Your Bathtub” – but the rest were new to me. Starting the collection knowing that there were two five-star stories in it definitely meant I knew this collection would be strong. 

As with any anthology, some stories really stood out to me and were my favourites and others I didn’t care for as much, but overall this is a really excellent collection (as are the other volumes in this series). As always, I’ve found a few new-to-me authors that I really look forward to reading more from. I appreciate the diversity of the stories featured in numerous respects – they include a range of genres (fantasy, sci-fi, horror, and several really genre-defying stories), diverse settings, diverse protagonists, and a breadth of themes – and absolutely recommend this anthology to speculative fiction readers.

Content warnings: violence, gun violence, police brutality, war, death, death of a child, death of a parent, blood, murder, animal cruelty, animal death, self harm, suicide, colonialism, racism, sexism, misogyny, gender based violence, abandonment 
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The Murders of Molly Southbourne by Tade Thompson

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dark fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No

3.0

What a creepy, creepy premise. There is a lot that's really effective here: consistent pacing, solid character development for a shorter text, some really unsettling scenes. I feel like this book has a lot of thematic undertones and implications that I'll be thinking on for a while; the plot itself is relatively straightforward but there are a lot of possibilities that kind of lurk around the edges of it that make it all the more unsettling. My only gripe with this is that the ending felt really abrupt; I'm not sure that the 'reveal' at the end was quite as effective as it could've been.

Content warnings: blood, gore, body horror, self-harm, murder, violence, death of a parent, death of a child, suicide
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The Sunforge by Sascha Stronach

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adventurous challenging medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes

3.5

3.5. I like a lot about this series so far - such an interesting world, diverse representation, compelling characters. I also feel like there might be a few too many interesting things going on - time jumps, POV jumps, and aspects to the plot that really complicate the POVs for reasons I won't spoil here... it's a lot.

I think I would've liked this novel a lot better had it included a brief "here's what happened in book 1" or even a list of characters, OR if I had read The Dawnhounds again before starting; reading the two 20-ish months apart definitely impacted my reading experience. This said, I also noted in my review of book 1 that the pacing made me feel like I missed something.  There is also way too much I like about this series not to continue, so I'll look forward to book 3 and be sure to come back and read detailed synopses of the first two books before proceeding.

Content warnings: death, war, violence, gun violence, homophobia, medical content, some body horror
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Dancing On Our Turtle's Back: Stories of Nishnaabeg Re-Creation, Resurgence, and a New Emergence by Leanne Betasamosake Simpson

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hopeful inspiring reflective slow-paced

5.0

Blood and Mistletoe: The History of the Druids in Britain by Ronald Hutton

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informative reflective slow-paced

5.0

Rigorous, well researched, and thorough - I would recommend Hutton's book to anyone interested in the subject of how the figure of the Druid has been taken up in different ways at different periods in British history. Hutton notes toward the end of the book that he could've just as easily titled it 'Thinking with Druids,' and this is certainly true as he traces the ideas that ancient Druids have inspired and the attitudes that various figures - archaeologists, religious leaders, writers, musicians, contemporary Druidry practitioners, and more - have taken toward them. With very little historical record of ancient Druids to go on (and the little there is to go on being questionable for a host of reasons), the figure of the Druid has meant - and means - many different things to different people. As a practicing Druid, I appreciate the respectful approach Hutton takes.

Content warnings: discussions of racism and colonialism
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