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zillanovikov's reviews
78 reviews
The Life and Times of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman: by Laurence Sterne
funny
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Maej by Dale Stromberg
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
reflective
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
i am STRUGGLING because this book is so good and i want to write a review that does it justice but it's EXQUISITE and i am but a humble review farmer tending my crops
like
as a young nerd who loved Robert Jordan for high fantasy with gender politics and political scheming I would have KILLED to read this book which is starting with that but also let's have LINGUISTICS ADVENTURES and EVERYONE IS QUEER and one of those plots that has a million threads but you're weaving a delicate, intricate, watertight tapastry (tapastries aren't watertight but you know what i mean, i can't use words like dale can)
the thing is i never trust authors with a book like this, i don't believe anyone can set up a story this ambitious and actually deliver on every character arc, every world building snap of a twig, that so much build up can lead to satisfaction
we've grown into old and cynical nerds with Lost and BSG offering us only set up and no payoff, Robert Jordan died young, it's always winter and never Christmas
this is Christmas guys
this is the real deal
open your gifts
what could go wrong when you start to wonder whose magic burns to fuel your world?
what could go wrong
like
as a young nerd who loved Robert Jordan for high fantasy with gender politics and political scheming I would have KILLED to read this book which is starting with that but also let's have LINGUISTICS ADVENTURES and EVERYONE IS QUEER and one of those plots that has a million threads but you're weaving a delicate, intricate, watertight tapastry (tapastries aren't watertight but you know what i mean, i can't use words like dale can)
the thing is i never trust authors with a book like this, i don't believe anyone can set up a story this ambitious and actually deliver on every character arc, every world building snap of a twig, that so much build up can lead to satisfaction
we've grown into old and cynical nerds with Lost and BSG offering us only set up and no payoff, Robert Jordan died young, it's always winter and never Christmas
this is Christmas guys
this is the real deal
open your gifts
what could go wrong when you start to wonder whose magic burns to fuel your world?
what could go wrong
Cherry-Rose: Blood & Wishes by Jeffery C. Wiederkehr
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
My favourite books are, like me, absurd and difficult to pin down. This makes it difficult to write a review. Unfortunately, if I don't write a review, you might not read Cherry Rose and then I can't talk about it with you, and it's one of those books that sticks in your head and wants to be discussed. So I'll try.
There is a lonely, unloved young woman in a cottage in the first. This is the start of a fairytale. Not a Disney fairytale, but Brothers Grimm, where bloody toes are cut off and stepmothers die in agony. Perhaps the young woman, who had done her best to be loved all her life, should have been the protagonist of the story, visited and made whole by the fairy. Instead, she becomes the mother, and fairytales are never kind to mothers, because mothers are never kind to daughters.
Cherry Rose, the doll-daughter, is visited by the fairy, but that only lets her escape the bell jar of the cottage, and the world is a series of bell jars upon bell jars, and what does it mean to escape only to find a bigger cage, a talking bear for father replacing a witch for mother. Fairytales are rarely kind to fathers, either. But if you were ever a daughter who needed to escape, you may recognize yourself in the pages. I hope you don't.
Sink into this book and let the ivy bury you, let the crows peck out your eyes until you cannot read to finish it. I promise it's worth it.
There is a lonely, unloved young woman in a cottage in the first. This is the start of a fairytale. Not a Disney fairytale, but Brothers Grimm, where bloody toes are cut off and stepmothers die in agony. Perhaps the young woman, who had done her best to be loved all her life, should have been the protagonist of the story, visited and made whole by the fairy. Instead, she becomes the mother, and fairytales are never kind to mothers, because mothers are never kind to daughters.
Cherry Rose, the doll-daughter, is visited by the fairy, but that only lets her escape the bell jar of the cottage, and the world is a series of bell jars upon bell jars, and what does it mean to escape only to find a bigger cage, a talking bear for father replacing a witch for mother. Fairytales are rarely kind to fathers, either. But if you were ever a daughter who needed to escape, you may recognize yourself in the pages. I hope you don't.
Sink into this book and let the ivy bury you, let the crows peck out your eyes until you cannot read to finish it. I promise it's worth it.
The River Queen: Book One Stonemaw Chronicles by T.M. Mayfield, T.M. Mayfield
adventurous
emotional
medium-paced
5.0
"Adara will either be my life or my doom."
This is an action-packed romantasy with all the goodies - fated mates, a magical kingdom on the brink of war, and the kind of love that starts as friendship. The chemistry feels relaxed and genuine, and the magical world is entrancing. I don't want to say too much because a LOT happens in this book and I don't want to do spoilers, but T.M. Mayfield is an author to watch!
This is an action-packed romantasy with all the goodies - fated mates, a magical kingdom on the brink of war, and the kind of love that starts as friendship. The chemistry feels relaxed and genuine, and the magical world is entrancing. I don't want to say too much because a LOT happens in this book and I don't want to do spoilers, but T.M. Mayfield is an author to watch!
Dangerous Liaisons by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos
dark
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Some of this book has, um, not aged well. But if you take it for what it was when it was written, it's very well written.
The Night Garden by Nicole Northwood
emotional
hopeful
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
This is a grown-up fairytale romance. Ellie and Max are foolish new adults, trying to navigate a world that doesn't have a place for people like them - people who live passionately and in the moment. This struggle between who they are and who the world demands they grow up into comes with a fairytale curse: behave, or be turned into a Beist, forced to live by day as a cat wandering the moors.
Nicole once again captivated my heart and my imagination. I loved Ellie and Max, and all the side characters who were as real and loveable as the main couple. A fantastic book from a consistently fantastic authour.
Nicole once again captivated my heart and my imagination. I loved Ellie and Max, and all the side characters who were as real and loveable as the main couple. A fantastic book from a consistently fantastic authour.
Mewing by Chloe Spencer
challenging
dark
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
"Better for a beautiful woman to be terrifying than terrorized, she decided." In Mewing, those are the only options available, and everyone is beautiful.
I have a notoriously low tolerence for gore or body grossness, and I found myself squinting during reading this book, unwilling to look away despite the squelching of my gut. I think Margo would have approved of my body's response, that strange mix of fascination and revulsion, beauty and horror, seduced and repelled in equal measure. I'm certain the thing in the basement would have approved.
Mewing's gender politics are as visceral as its characters. Beauty is a standard created by and for men, but women are the ones best at making each other bleed. There's hardly a man in sight--I can't recall a single line uttered by a human male character--as women destroy and reconstruct each other for fleeting moments of validation. Men may hold ultimate power, but it's women who enforce it.
Steel your stomach, and read this book.
I have a notoriously low tolerence for gore or body grossness, and I found myself squinting during reading this book, unwilling to look away despite the squelching of my gut. I think Margo would have approved of my body's response, that strange mix of fascination and revulsion, beauty and horror, seduced and repelled in equal measure. I'm certain the thing in the basement would have approved.
Mewing's gender politics are as visceral as its characters. Beauty is a standard created by and for men, but women are the ones best at making each other bleed. There's hardly a man in sight--I can't recall a single line uttered by a human male character--as women destroy and reconstruct each other for fleeting moments of validation. Men may hold ultimate power, but it's women who enforce it.
Steel your stomach, and read this book.
Read and Then Burn This by Ryszard I. Merey
challenging
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Remember when you were 14 years old and you sat on the edge of your bed and put a new CD in your Walkman and your headphones over your ears and as you listened to the music you thought, "This musician has been here, inside my bedroom, inside my skull. They must have been here. They understand."
And then you got older and you weren't 14 anymore and that sense of wonder from someone who understands a part of yourself you'd never been able to articulate doesn't happen so often, and besides, most feelings are universal so what's the magic in someone perfectly encapsulating a sensation, a feeling, that everyone has anyway. It's not special. It's not about you, alone in your bedroom, wondering what it would look like to find a connection.
This book hit me like a burning dump truck.
There's a special kind of lonliness that's not queer specifically, anyone can feel it, but it hits the part of myself that doesn't know who I am and who anyone else is either, not in their entirety, not what it means to be an authentic self, to stop reaching for something perfect and bury white hands in the filth and squalor because it's better to feel unclean than nothing. Anything's better than being cold.
If you're queer, or lonely, or burning, read this
And then you got older and you weren't 14 anymore and that sense of wonder from someone who understands a part of yourself you'd never been able to articulate doesn't happen so often, and besides, most feelings are universal so what's the magic in someone perfectly encapsulating a sensation, a feeling, that everyone has anyway. It's not special. It's not about you, alone in your bedroom, wondering what it would look like to find a connection.
This book hit me like a burning dump truck.
There's a special kind of lonliness that's not queer specifically, anyone can feel it, but it hits the part of myself that doesn't know who I am and who anyone else is either, not in their entirety, not what it means to be an authentic self, to stop reaching for something perfect and bury white hands in the filth and squalor because it's better to feel unclean than nothing. Anything's better than being cold.
If you're queer, or lonely, or burning, read this
The Crying of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon
challenging
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
I like clever postmodern books. This is a clever postmodern book. Ergo.
But I didn't really like any of the characters. Oedipa, at times, but at times not. Certainly no one else. The acts of degeracy didn't land for me as the would have when the book was published - either too banal or too criminal for my modern sensibilities.
I'm glad I read it but I doubt I'll reread.
But I didn't really like any of the characters. Oedipa, at times, but at times not. Certainly no one else. The acts of degeracy didn't land for me as the would have when the book was published - either too banal or too criminal for my modern sensibilities.
I'm glad I read it but I doubt I'll reread.
Váried Parályses by Dale Stromberg
challenging
emotional
funny
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? N/A
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
5.0
Dale delivers another fantastic book of mind bending short fiction. Great stories.