Tag: Books

Rubble You’ll Find in a Junkyard: A Review of Cinder

by cephalopodiatry, posted in Books

It’s great to see you, traveler! For today’s review, we’re surveying the sphere of Cinder, the first installment of the Lunar Chronicles Series by Marissa Meyer, the first novel I read in 2021 C.E. — and my first one-star review of the year. This ought to be a tendentious review!

Let’s do this!

Amazon.com: Cinder: Book One of the Lunar Chronicles (The Lunar Chronicles, 1) (9781250768889): Meyer, Marissa: Books

SYNOPSIS:

Humans and androids crowd the raucous streets of New Beijing. A deadly plague ravages the population. From space, a ruthless Lunar people watch, waiting to make their move. No one knows that Earth’s fate hinges on one girl… Cinder, a gifted mechanic, is a cyborg.

She’s a second-class citizen with a mysterious past, reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister’s illness. But when her life becomes intertwined with the handsome Prince Kai’s, she suddenly finds herself at the center of an intergalactic struggle, and a forbidden attraction. Caught between duty and freedom, loyalty and betrayal, she must uncover secrets about her past in order to protect her world’s future.

Rep: cluttered Asian-inspired world; Asian-coded characters

Content Warnings: blood and death; xenophobia and discrimination; non-consensual medical experimentation; needles; illness and plague; emotional abuse

tl;dr: Do I recommend this book?

Not really! (Thus my exclusion of promotional links!)

MY RATING: ★

Ralph In Danger - Meme Template and Creator

I know there’s a lot of love for Cinder — its aggregated 4.14-star rating on Goodreads is indicative of that. This review is by no means a charge on the author (though I do mention the author a few times below) or the series, nor do I intend to disparage your affection towards this book if you enjoyed it. It’s awesome if you like Cinder! I’m glad you do.

My opinions do not and should not reflect the opinions of others. With reference to my discussion of Asian cultures in this review, I do not and should represent Asian people’s feelings about this book. (Nor do I or should I represent Asian people’s feelings period!) These are simply my thoughts on the novel and my personal experience reading it, as well as a few other notes I had.

With that being said:

What a mess!

Continue reading “Rubble You’ll Find in a Junkyard: A Review of Cinder” →

Sharpened Blades in a Gilded World: A Review of These Violent Delights

by cephalopodiatry, posted in Books

Welcome back, traveler! Let’s discuss one of the most anticipated debuts of the decade so far — the silver-medal novel in my recent data-gathering book compilation, The 20 Best Diverse Releases of 2020, According to the Internet Book Community.

Amazon.com: These Violent Delights (9781534457690): Gong, Chloe: Books

SYNOPSIS:

The year is 1926, and Shanghai hums to the tune of debauchery.

A blood feud between two gangs runs the streets red, leaving the city helpless in the grip of chaos. At the heart of it all is eighteen-year-old Juliette Cai, a former flapper who has returned to assume her role as the proud heir of the Scarlet Gang — a network of criminals far above the law. Their only rivals in power are the White Flowers, who have fought the Scarlets for generations. And behind every move is their heir, Roma Montagov, Juliette’s first love… and first betrayal.

But when gangsters on both sides show signs of instability culminating in clawing their own throats out, the people start to whisper. Of a contagion, a madness. Of a monster in the shadows. As the deaths stack up, Juliette and Roma must set their guns — and grudges — aside and work together, for if they can’t stop this mayhem, then there will be no city left for either to rule.

Goodreads | Book Depository | Indigo

Rep: Chinese author; Chinese setting, protagonist, and characters; transgender side character; Korean side character; queer side characters

Content Warnings: substance use; blood, gore, and violence; explosion; death, murder, and loss of a loved one; self-mutilation while possessed; insects

tl;dr: Do I recommend this book?

MY RATING: ★★★

Note to self: Stop getting over-hyped over new releases! You will only feel pain!

Don’t get me wrong, traveler. I adore so much about this book. It is easily one of my favorite reads of 2020 — the last book I read in that year! — and the praise for it is incredibly deserved. (I’m right there with that praise. Do you see me standing over there? That’s me, shrieking commendations. I’m cheering so hard for this novel.)

These Violent Delights was tightly-woven. Chloe Gong is a talented writer, and she crafted this novel so skillfully. I will support her writing career with enthusiasm.

But, like. My dear traveler… this book would be stellar if it simply were not this book. Certain facets of These Violent Delights were marvelous, but I wish they weren’t trapped in the plot and premise they were given.

Continue reading “Sharpened Blades in a Gilded World: A Review of These Violent Delights” →

The 20 Best Diverse Releases of 2020, According to the Internet Book Community

by cephalopodiatry, posted in Books

Can you believe it? It’s 2021! Time no longer exists, if it ever did in the first place.

Everything held in the boundaries of the seemingly endless, three-hundred-sixty-six days of 2020 (and these frightening inaugural weeks of 2021) has been up-in-the-air, but one thing’s for sure: we’ve kept ourselves anchored to the Earth by the provisions of fiction. It’s good to step back at times and seek out the escapism we need to stay grounded.

The books in this list are perfect vessels of catharsis and reverie.

Last year, in late December, I conducted a poll across platforms such as Twitter, Instagram, and Discord to gather a consensus on the 2020 releases and sequels you all loved. Each of the books presented in the poll were written by BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ authors, and featured wonderful diverse stories across genres.

Let’s dive into the 20 best diverse releases of 2020, according to you, the Internet book community!

Continue reading “The 20 Best Diverse Releases of 2020, According to the Internet Book Community” →

Yee-Haw, This Wasn’t It: A Review of Six-Gun Snow White (ft. Eight Great Books by Indigenous Authors)

by cephalopodiatry, posted in Books

Hello again, traveler! (Scroll to the images of a fluffy Highland cows divider for the rec list! In fact, read the rec list first! But only if you want.)

Six-Gun Snow White | Book by Catherynne M. Valente, Charlie Bowater | Official Publisher Page | Simon & Schuster

SYNOPSIS:

Forget the dark, enchanted forest. Picture instead a masterfully evoked Old West where you are more likely to find coyotes as the seven dwarves. Insert into this scene a plain-spoken, appealing narrator who relates the history of our heroine’s parents — a Nevada silver baron who forced the Crow people to give up one of their most beautiful daughters, Gun That Sings, in marriage to him. Although her mother’s life ended as hers began, so begins a remarkable tale: equal parts heartbreak and strength. This girl has been born into a world with no place for a half-native, half-white child. After being hidden for years, a very wicked stepmother finally gifts her with the name Snow White, referring to the pale skin she will never have. Filled with fascinating glimpses through the fabled looking glass and a close-up look at hard living in the gritty gun-slinging West, this is an utterly enchanting story… at once familiar and entirely new. 

MY RATING: ★★

“Saint Michael doesn’t question why when the Big Dog says git.” (I just enjoyed this line.)

I picked up this book from my school’s online library because it didn’t have a wait time, hehe.

Catherynne M. Valente is (probably; this position often fluctuates! I’m more of Ken Liu stan nowadays) my favorite writer. Her works are some of the wildest rides I’ve ever caught hold of.  Six-Gun Snow White is no exception.

I’m still giving it two stars, though.

Hear me out!

Continue reading “Yee-Haw, This Wasn’t It: A Review of Six-Gun Snow White (ft. Eight Great Books by Indigenous Authors)” →

Words Like Snow and Steel: A Winterglass Review

by cephalopodiatry, posted in Books

Hello, traveler!

Let’s take a peek at Winterglass, a novella written by Benjanun Sriduangkaew. It’s the first installment of the Her Pitiless Command series, an epic fantasy lesbian retelling of Hans Christian Andersen’s The Snow Queen, which takes place in a world based on Southeast and South Asian cultures where the primary form of magic-technology is powered by the dead.

Synopsis:

The city-state Sirapirat once knew only warmth and monsoon. When the Winter Queen conquered it, she remade the land in her image, turning Sirapirat into a country of snow and unending frost. But an empire is not her only goal. In secret, she seeks the fragments of a mirror whose power will grant her deepest desire.

At her right hand is General Lussadh, who bears a mirror shard in her heart, as loyal to winter as she is plagued by her past as a traitor to her country. Tasked with locating other glass-bearers, she finds one in Nuawa, an insurgent who’s forged herself into a weapon that will strike down the queen.

To earn her place in the queen’s army, Nuawa must enter a deadly tournament where the losers’ souls are given in service to winter. To free Sirapirat, she is prepared to make sacrifices: those she loves, herself, and the complicated bond slowly forming between her and Lussadh.

If the splinter of glass in Nuawa’s heart doesn’t destroy her first.

My Rating: ★★★

(A rather unrelated note: have you ever seen a more beautiful cover, dear traveler? Its artist, Anna Dittman, is an absolute legend!)

Maybe I just don’t have enough brain cells to understand this book properly (there are no wrinkles up in my cranium, yo. Up there, it’s as smooth as the rolling sea), but I must say: Winterglass was rather difficult to dig through!

 

Continue reading “Words Like Snow and Steel: A Winterglass Review” →

Why I Love to Read

by cephalopodiatry, posted in Stories

When did you first start reading?

I started reading when I was too small to reach the middle shelf. (I’m still far too small to reach the middle shelf, but still.) My mother read to me every night when I was little. We’d curl up together in my bed (I remember my Dora the Explorer-themed bedspread and stuffed purple unicorns), and my mother would stack the hardback picture books (gently retrieved from our black wooden shelf against the wall of the living room) between us.

While she narrated aloud, I’d follow her index finger as it brushed against a page’s structured sentences. Her soft and expressive voice transformed my small bedroom into the palace from Twelve Dancing Princesses, the garden from Little Miss Spider, or the house from Pinkalicious. (Plus, the musical versions of those books absolutely slap — especially Barbie and the Twelve Dancing Princesses. Period!) I would imagine we were in Paris with Madeline and her boarding school sisters; sometimes, we’d be exploring the cut-out worlds of Eric Carle and the Foolish Magistrate’s home in Sagwa, the Chinese Siamese Cat.

Eventually I leveled up (as one does after gaining experience points); I no longer needed bedtime stories to lull me to sleep.  

Though I never grew out of stories.

Continue reading “Why I Love to Read” →