Ethan Poole

Exceptional short story collection! All of them were great, but my favorites: "The Paper Menagerie", "The Man Who Ended History", "State Change", and "Mono no aware".

Such an interesting novel. The stream-of-consciousness writing style was hard to read at times (it required immense focus), but it was also really well done. It felt like reading people's *actual* thoughts—in the disjoint, uncontrolled manner in which they actually occur. I definitely want to reread this book; I know that I'll get more out of it.

Great novel. It's of course ironic that it's *this* novel that made John Irving famous.

Nice ending to the series.

Miserable people acting miserably towards one another. I think I just needed there to be something redeeming in the book.

Hunger Games + Lord of the Flies + too many plot twists. It was entertaining though, so I might pick up the next one.

A fantastic conclusion to an incredible series: First, phenomenal world building; the world felt more real than anything I've read in fantasy in some time. Second, interesting characters and compelling plot. Third, a touch of the literary; some of the themes that resonated with me: the roles of bureaucracy and the intelligentsia, cultural identity, the power of stories, power vs. morality vs. pride ("the grace of kings"), and the joys of food.

I was hesitant at first to pick up this series: it's very long, and I've grown kinda bored with epic fantasy. So, I'm very glad that I did take the plunge—worth it!

Loved it. But it's downright weird and hard to describe. Definitely a book that I want to reread.

Lemmed/DNFed at 56%. It was just incredibly boring and hollow.

Given all the hype, I expected a 5-star read, but I got a great 4-star read. Having recently read David Copperfield in preparation, this book was an interesting reading experience in that I knew what was going to happen, but not how. The story was moving, but I think the messaging would have been more impactful if it were more subtle.

I love this world.

Great epic fantasy. Better than the first book—in part, I think, because the characters are better. I really like that there are real stakes, no one is a superhero (à la SA), and problems are won through ingenuity (cool tech, tactic, gambits, etc.) more often than through violence or magic. The world-building is just incredible.

Beautiful, sorrowful, and shame-inducing. And, as I've seen it described elsewhere, including on the back cover, “subtle” and “graceful”. A very powerful and moving novel that everyone should read. (I also liked this more than Beloved, but now I want to go back and reread Beloved.)

I've been meaning to read BK for a very long time. It was one of the few Russian classics that I hadn't read. Overall, I liked it—I guess for the big ideas. The prosecutor's speech and “après moi, le déluge” in particular really resonated with me. However, BK is not very good fiction: bad pacing, turgid dialogue, horribly unrealistic women characters, and not much plot given the absurd length. There is also a lot of religious dribble, especially in the first half, which I really struggled through. In the end, I'm glad I read BK, and I would generally recommend that people read it at some point, but I doubt I'll ever pick it up again.

Re the translation: I read the Pevear & Volokhonsky translation. I appreciate that they're going for a more literal translation of the Russian. However, I found it annoying that this often resulted in English sentences that are simply ungrammatical (in the formal linguistic sense; e.g. illicit argument structure for the given predicate, violations of the anti-that-trace constraint). Why?

Lemmed/DNFed at 59%. I can see that it was trying to be funny, but I just found it stupid.

Too much plot armor—to the point where every character who dies is then immediately resurrected. Too long.

Solid epic fantasy with phenomenal world-building. The characters are somewhat lackluster; it's very much a “warring of ideas”-style book, where the characters are (in essence) representatives of ideals. Overall, it felt like a lot of other epic fantasy—thus, not special per se, but nonetheless very well done.

I picked this up as “homework” for Demon Copperhead. Having finished, I can appreciate the book for what it is: a coming-of-age story. It's very touching and has great characters. I can see why it resonates with certain people. It is a bit of a slog, and I put it down several times to read other stuff.

(Also, my 100th book for 2023!)

The ending! I listened to the audiobook, but I would recommend ebook/print; at times, the two different timelines were a little hard to follow in audio.

Interesting world building, but the characters and plot are meh. Not going to continue.

Another fun and interesting collection of essays (which makes me think that maybe I like essays, even though I'm most often not in the mood for one). Favorites: "E Unibus Pluram" (of course), "Getting Away from Being Pretty Much Away from It All", and "A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again".

Fun, fast-paced read.

Just a beautiful, insightful story. I listened to the audiobook, and Meryl Streep's performance was (of course) above and beyond. For me, the book itself is 4-stars, but bumped up because of the narration. I'm so glad that I finally picked up a book by Ann Patchett, whose Friday book recommendations on TikTok I always look forward to!

I wasn't sure what was happening (in a good, mysterious way) until the end. A strange, but engrossing book.

Interesting ideas and settings, but a little thin on plot.