Ninett

I loved the character development in this. The jumps in time between each of the books of the quartet allow the reader to follow a single character from reckless youth to seasoned veteran of magic. Sparrowhawk goes through a lot, and learns from his mistakes. Earthsea is a vast, beautifully detailed world through which the reader is gently led as the story unfolds.

I now realise that the magic system that relies on magicians knowing the true names of things does not come from Rothfuss as I originally thought (naively) after having read his work, but traces its roots to the Earthsea quartet and after a bit of research, even further back to Egyptian mythology. To me, this is the best magic system because it feels very human.

Succint, to the point, and clear explanation of all of the groundwork that an individual investor needs to lay in order to get started in the world of personal finance. It doesn't cut corners and tells the reader all that she needs to understand. There are quite a few points it skates over, and this is a good thing, because the reader is assumed to be a beginner (which I am). I loved the language Pete used in this to make it completely accessible, and the fact that he did not condescend to the reader either with layers of metaphors posing as simple explanations.

There are actionable points at the end of every chapter, and for once I did not find these to be gimmicky like I sometimes do with self-help style books.

For me this installment was not as good as the first two.

I was hoping for something better to come of reading 800 pages worth of trekking across the map than that Verity turns into a dragon and Fitz essentially gets nothing for his toils. I still liked it because I adore Hobb's writing in general, but the ending for me just did not hit the spot.

I thought a book about dinosaurs from the Victorian age would be right up my alley—and for the most part, it would have been, if not for the gross racism and sexism, which tainted the whole thing for me. I was also chilled by the way the characters treated a supposedly pristine, untampered-with biological system they had discovered: killing things, trampling over everything, causing the extinction of an intelligent species (!!!), and stealing baby animals from their parents. I dunno, just not for me. I'm just not the type who can enjoy this mindset, even as fiction. I like dinosaurs, but this was too much of a bravado story from the peak of the 'man dominates world' epoch.

Brief, to the point, and varied enough to remain interesting. In 2025 I doubt that anyone is going into reading a book like this without knowledge of the attention economy and how this is viciously exploited by attention engineers at social media companies, so some parts are more review of what I think everyone already is aware of. It did teach me new things, though, and I have been able to more critically evaluate my phone use as a result of reading this (I deleted two book and time tracking apps because they were gateway distractions and the information isn't really THAT useful). I haven't been on social media for a long time anyway, so the focus on persuading the reader to use less of it did not hit home for me, but I still think it's an important cause and don't resent having that part in the book.

As with the first book, the characters are enjoyable, and the magic system is actually pretty unique. It feels weird to say, but I do really love the buildings in these books, both Il Bastone and Black Elm are beautifully described and atmospheric.

I am just still not captured by the main character. She's not lacking traits and personality, but I think I just don't click with her. I think also that there are some loopholes in the plotting of this one, but I am not invested enough to take proper note of them. I read the second one because I wanted to see if Darlington is finally rescued, but I can't see myself continuing the series when more come out.

Interesting, human-centered take on the disease-wrecks-civilisation story, with a hopeful ending. The representations of the human need for belonging and the world building were excellent. I liked the protagonist.

On the flip side, the writing didn’t strike the chord for me, though that may be a matter of taste. The temporal to-and-fro structure didn’t keep me as interested as a more linear storyline might have. I didn’t like the thread of the famous guy, which took up too much novel real estate in my opinion.

DNF'd a long time ago. I tried to read it as an 18 year old. It was the summer holidays, I read this while baking in the sun between nights spent going out with friends. I was off to uni in September and this book just fell out of my life. It's ten years later and I still haven't come round to finishing it (or university). Also, I was reading a Hungarian translation - not usually an issue, but I was never a fan of Russian literature Hungarian translations.

Update for new attempt: I picked this out as my commute read a few moons ago in an effort to finish at least one Russian classic. It surprised me. Life has evidently given me a lot to ruminate over since I was 18. I found myself reflected in Raskolnikov's character. This time I saw depth and complexity where before I fell asleep in boredom. Maybe some books just require maturity. 

This is an interesting piece of writing. In some bizarre way, it reminds me of a meticulously curated pen and pencil library I made when I was a child. Each writing utensil had a serial number, and there was a ledger in which I kept detailed records about each item in the library. 
The story was good, the illustrations were beautifully drawn and the typesetting around them was lovely. 

The writing was enjoyable, and the magic system a kind of spin on the very classic format of 'utter a spell and wave hands', so it was a very traditional-feeling novel in the fantasy writing domain. I enjoyed the elements of Eastern European lore and folk culture that were included, and I'm pleased that the author has family ties to that place (sorry Grishaverse).

Now for the part that took it down a few pegs for me: the Dragon is an absolutely awful man. He doesn't make up for his abhorrent behaviour and he is a fundamentally unkind character. This would be fine, if his relationship with Agnieszka weren't shown in a positive light. I can't understand when writers make the female character fall in love with an abusive man and portray the relationship in a complementary way, as is the case here - and then I am not even mentioning the age gap. The story was good but not memorable.

Thank you for inducting me into the world of Australian history. I learned a lot - both about the original custodians of the Australian land, and about the colonisers who displaced them, through the lens of someone who identifies as being of the former group. This conversation is valuable and the time is ripe for us all to take a step back and survey the wisdom of the ancients to help up live more in tune with nature.

Unfortunately, the author took an adversarial tone which put me off the book sometimes. I empathise with the emotion behind this and support the point of view presented, but I think combative language in a book aiming to raise awareness and enlighten is counterproductive.

Maybe a tad slow and some repetition.