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I Am Not A Bookworm- a review of Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir

by with No Comment Sci-Fi

Our final Pride Month read is a sci fi with lesbians and skeletons, written by a lesbian author who was raised in my homeland New Zealand!

Gideon couldn’t care less for the house of the ninth, but when she is chosen to accompany the Reverend Daughter Harrowhawk her chances of escaping the necromantic hellhole of her home are completely thwarted. For the Emperor has summoned the best necromancers of each of the nine planets and their cavaliers, which Gideon has been newly appointed as. The two childhood nemesises must join forces to complete challenges and ascend to the first house to join the Emperor’s side. But these games have become particularly deadly as the nature of these challenges get revealed.

This book is very dense. The writing style made it at times difficult to follow along, and on account of my brain being small I must rate this lower. This is especially difficult considering that if I didn’t read the next part of a book within 24 hours I would forget a lot of what happened previously. A bookworm would love this, but I don’t think I am a bookworm anymore with how long it took me to read this and understand everything.

The characters, and the book itself, had so much character to it. I will admit at times it was difficult to keep track of cast and who was who, but it paid off very fast. With each pair of characters having their own flavour of undeath and their relationships standing out in powerful ways. The character aesthetics tied each character off with a little bow, so I could love each and every one of them in their own little ways. No to mention how easily their motivations were shown.

That being said, Harrow and Gideon’s relationship could have been a bit more than what it wound up being at the end of the book. It didn’t quite hit the enemies to lovers fantasy that everyone said it would be, and that kind of disappointed me. Things were either so rushed or so slow at the wrong times and I don’t think they had the chemistry for it.

The complexity of learning this magic system was salvaged by a very simple plot. A contest is a classic! People underestimate how styles of plots can really make a story what it is. Fantasy and sci fi get so hooked up on quests and journeys that it was refreshing to see another contest in this genre, especially with the addition of puzzles that teach us about the complexities of necromancy.

Gideon the Ninth gets a score of 3.5/5. If I was a bookworm this would have been better.

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It Can’t Be THAT Easy – a review of Burn Down, Rise Up by Vincent Tirado

by with No Comment Fantasy

We have another Pride Month review. This time it’s a dark fantasy that goes into NYC history with a sapphic relationship written by an NB author.

When Raquel’s mother gets hospitalised and her crush’s cousin becomes the next victim in a long list of disappearances, she’s convinced they’re connected. She and her crush Charlize soon learn about the Echo Game and the many conspiracies surrounding it. Their investigations lead them to the New York subways, a dark history of the Bronx, and a twisted alternate reality that leads them to making big mistakes.

The worldbuilding and the connections between the real world and the unnatural were stellar. It was what hooked me that combined into a story that is The Unsleeping City meets Stranger Things. Everything was so richly integrated, how the monsters were a reflection of what historically happened to the Bronx in the 80s. How the humans got affected by the dark alternate world. And above all else, how New York wasn’t the only affected city. I loved hearing hints of other histories across the world, and it makes a promising premise for an anthology series. But anyway, the world itself stole the book away. It had the best vibes that creeped you out at any possible turn.

The characters felt too much the same to each other. I cannot tell you the personality of the main characters to save my life. Raquel, Charlize, and every other character around their age felt so much the same minus one trait, if I was lucky. Oh, this one has the hots for Raquel and she doesn’t reciprocate. Like, is that even personality? They blur as I write this review even now. You should know by now how much I hate characters without character. And I was hoping they would show up this whole time. Guess what? They didn’t.

Second, the characters had it too easy. I like victory, but it didn’t feel earned in the climax of this novel. When this is marketed as a horror or a dark fantasy, I expect more terror and sacrifices than what I got delivered. I expect a greater struggle. The ending felt more suited to a middle grade story. Especially with the powers that got them off so easy. It felt too enlightening for such a dark setting. Altogether it made for a hollow conclusion.

Burn Down, Rise Up gets a score of 3/5. Let my characters struggle, please and thank you.

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More Than One Perspective – a review of Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo

by with No Comment Historical Fiction

The next (and belated) Pride Month review takes a look at LGBTQ+ history with this sapphic novel set in Chinatown written by a lesbian author. But this dives into more than just being queer.

Lily Hu is a first generation Chinese immigrant with a dream to help astronauts get into space. As she gets to know her classmate Katherine Miller she begins to understand more about herself. How she’s drawn to a romance between two women in a novel she picked up, and she’s mesmorised by a masculine presenting performer at a nightclub she frequents with Katherine. And then there’s the feelings she hasdeveloped for her. But in a time in history where deportation looms over her family and same sex relationships are illegal, Lily and Katherine will risk anything just to be together.

Lo’s writing style was captivating. It combined intelectual and insightful journeys through the mind with enchanting displays through Lily’s eyes, making it a very medium style that wasn’t a breeze to read over but you love to pick up every word and detail. I’m not normally a fan of slow pacing, but this novel was able to entrance me with how it took its time and built out the world. It was a pacing you wanted to take your time with.

Character was very well done across the board, from leading to minor characters. Lily and Katherine were obvious favourites with how well rounded they were, from their ambitions to discovering their love for each other. Their journey to lesbian romance was real and raw. It was never a shock, it just made sense. It developed naturally, and I loved that discovery.

This book felt very authentic to urban Chinese culture. I wouldn’t know much about it myself, but with what media outputs nowadays I can tell a good portrayal of a culture and a good story unique to a culture. This is one of them, especially with a niche aspect of that culture. It was great to read about three cultures in one – 50s, Chinese American, and lesbians. This is what really made the character feel well rounded above all else. Her identity was multi-sided, and it was amazing to see all sides of her, especially when other characters brought out aspects of her personality and identity in different ways.

So needless to say, Lily carried this novel.

Last Night at the Telegraph Club gets a score of 4.5/5. Many faces of a single person make a beautiful story.

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Real and Revealed – a review of Loveless by Alice Oseman

by with No Comment Contemporary

Oh look. An Ace Author reviews yet another ace book. Hate to break it to you, but we’re gonna get a lot more of this in the future. And this is not just any ace book. This is the ace book. The first recommendation anyone would give to you when you say you want a book with ace representation at the forefront.

So let’s judge the popular.

Georgia starts to wonder why she hasn’t fallen in love with anyone despite how much she wants to. Not a single crush, not a single person she has found attraction towards, not a single desire to have sex. And when people notice this about her and an accident reveals that as her final year of high school comes to a close, she makes herself a vow to fall in love as she starts a new life at university. And as she realises how picky she is, asexuality and aromanticism come to her knowledge for the first time. And she doesn’t know what it means or anything about why she doesn’t want to love no matter how hard she tries.

This novel had stellar characters like no other contemporary novels characters I have read about. A tight cast makes for an in depth focus on each of them and their adversities. And each of them brought something different to the table. Their arcs and adversities, their personalities and the the way they present themselves. It is rare to find casts so diverse and yet likeable, with no villains and people just living their lives. This felt so much like just people living their lives.

More so on that point, this novel did feel like a life. It had just enough pop culture to make it feel current but not saturations that date it or make it feel like a walking advertisement. It had characters doing real things and having real worries. Oseman illustrated such reality that it felt warming to read this. Having spent a lot of my university life in lockdown, I was glad to have lived it through this book instead.

Once again, a novel about discovering asexuality has me feel so visible. But unlike other asexual characters and their stories, this one did even more. It challenged the way I thought of my asexuality and what to do with it. Now I’m not like Georgia, who is fully ace and aro. I just have asexuality. But even so, I read this in a time of my life where a lot of my relationships with people were forced to change. But the lessons with how to treat all relationships in my life with passion and care when I truly cared for someone really stuck with me. It’s something even a non-ace can take away from this book.

Read it so you know what I mean. I dare you.

Loveless gets a score of 5/5. Be there. Be loving. For everyone.