Sarah
My rating of this book may be a little unfair since I was reading it before my wedding and had little brain power left during that time. That said, it definitely felt a little disappointing after Hyperion was such a unique and gripping story. Increasing the scope so far beyond the main characters just made it drag for me a little bit, and I felt like the whole ai situation was kind of confusing. Still kind of a crazy book with lots of twists and a very interesting premise.
It took me forever to read this because there is only so much I could really take at a time. It's definitely the most realistic dystopian fiction I've ever read - I could genuinely imagine myself arguing with some conservative family member about about whether or not this is ok. It was easy to imagine moderates saying “I don't love it, but they are criminals” and imagining that they are unscathed by living in a world where this is happening.
Personally, I would recommend Just Mercy or The Sun Does Shine over this book if I was trying to change a mind about the criminal justice system. I think my reading of this benefitted a lot from the nonfiction background provided by those books. What this one added for me was a visceral sense of how deeply capitalism is intertwined with every aspect of the prison system, and a more nuanced understanding of what abolitionism means. I was horrified to see how much people were able to disassociate from and even relish in the suffering of others, and to understand that this is an absolutely honest depiction of humanity. The real-world statistics included at various points in the story were used to amazing effect.
A striking moment to me was when a character claimed that abolitionists needed to think about the jobs created by chain-gang. It reminded me of another book, The Feather Thief, which described how the migratory bird was opposed because the hatters who used the feathers of nearly-extinct birds would be out of work. It reminds me of our inability to move away from fossil fuels or terrible agricultural systems. How many times has this kind of argument been used to justify obvious wrongs? How far will we go to enable a few people to profit?
What??? She thinks he hates her but he's actually been sooooo obsessed with her this whole time? He's sooooo big and tall? He's a programmer but he somehow has the muscle definition of an Olympic swim champion?
Does Ali Hazelwood feel at least a little silly about copy and pasting her male leads? I keep getting drawn in by the nerdy settings but this kind of had me rolling my eyes. There was NOT enough established interaction between them before the events of this book to justify anything more than a decent crush. I was honestly creeped out by this guy.
Pros of this book being a novella: no contrived breakup/misunderstanding after they get together, I was able to listen to most of it while doing some chores and making a batch of cookies, it's helping me build some momentum on reading again after a few months with no mental capacity for it.
Cons of this book being a novella: Adapting a book series to a video game is an awesome setting, I wanted more of those discussions. I liked how the fictional book series mirrored their own feelings and the loving way they talked about books and video games.
Side note: I would really prefer more male body diversity in straight romance novels in general. 6'4 and broad and muscular is not the only kind of attractive guy.
Partway though this book I realized it was meant to be cozy fantasy and not intricate-world-building fantasy. There were things I could nit-pick but I think it was detailed and consistent enough for what it was. I think the main character's actions didn't totally fit with her self-described uncaring personality which could have been a discrepancy between how she saw herself and her real personality, but I thought it was a little bit of a lazy way to convey the narrative arc of love warming her cold heart without being willing to really show it. Ultimately, I enjoyed the fairy tale vibes and the community coming together.
Making out immediately after eating BBQ ribs is not cute imo.
As someone who loves the bake off, I feel like I could have been a lot more invested in the cooking show aspect. Also they kind of teased me when Dahlia says at the beginning that she mostly makes vegetarian recipes but then the rest of the book is meat central. Similarly to something wild and wonderful, the relationship conflict largely comes down to “we don't live in the same place” which I like because the author isn't just forcing one of the characters to do something dumb to cause conflict. Very nice overall.
This is a book that got me excited about books again. The detailed and immersive worldbuilding was so welcome after reading some books where those components felt a little shallow and unsatisfying. I have been shying away from more dense or heavy books lately and this reminded me how good it feels to get immersed in something more complicated.
I'm often underwhelmed by short stories, so I wouldn't think a book that is basically 6 connected short stories would be compelling to me, but each one completely stood up on it's own while also helping you puzzle out the overall narrative. The scifi details are dropped in with little explanation and your understanding of the world builds up over the course of the book - but rather than being confusing it was super immersive not having things explained to you. Each story was insane and the structure was brilliant, I'm really excited to read the second one.
The whole setup for this book was that, after an 8 year relationship, the main character and her FIANCE broke up over a 4 minute phone call and never had a conversation about why they broke up and never had a conversation before that about anything being wrong in their relationship or trying to fix their problems. You're supposed to root for them after that? COME ON that is way too much to be explained away by “he's self deprecating and she's conflict avoidant.” I just don't think you can end an engagement like that and if you do there's really no coming back from it. And I never feel like there's that much of an attempt to explain why you should want them to get back together except for how incredibly lustful they are for each other and how it will make their friend vacations awkward if they break up. He's a jerk for thinking he knows what's best for her and they're both dumb for thinking that ending an 8 year relationship doesn't merit, I don't know, even 30 minutes of conversation.
I actually did enjoy the storyline about her questioning her people pleasing tendencies and realizing that maybe she doesn't really want to be a surgeon. Ok that's an interesting story. But quitting to work in a pottery studio because she's made like 5 beginner pots and enjoyed it is just dumb. I'm sure a lot of people have fantasies or ignoring their massive student loan debt and living a leisurely life doing a hobby they enjoy but I'm assuming it might take a little more than a few months of beginner pottery classes to make a career out of it?
For me, there wasn't necessarily tons of new information in this book compared to other books/articles/ect that I have already read. What made this one unique to me was the less individualistic approach. He really addressed focus as an environmental and collective problem. I thought his comparison of focus to the obesity epidemic was really interesting, basically that when there was a huge increase in obesity in our society as a whole we decided to blame the individual and market a bunch of diet schemes that don't usually work rather than work to address what changes to society might be having this impact. He showed this pattern over and over again and it really makes you mad about how much profit is prioritized over wellbeing. I also listened to an interview with the guy who's trying to add “blue zone” policies in America and I am really believing in the importance of doing things that make healthy behaviors easier, like increasing walkability, rather than telling people that they are failures for not fitting 5 hours of exercise into their stressed out overworked lives.
The part about air pollution was horrifying and the fact that having a livable environment is somehow a polarizing and partisan issue is idiotic and I'm not sure if his call for collective action in this book made me feel optimistic or depressed. It's hard to imagine that it's possible in a country where we're currently losing rights more than we're gaining them.
This book covered a wide range of topics and some of them were a little too shallow for me. In particular, the chapter about diet warns you against processed food but doesn't really give good advice about how to eat. While this is not a book about nutrition, I think it's a little dangerous when people with restrictive diets often can have more disordered eating and less nutritious diets overall. He also includes meat as one of his “healthy” foods (very debatable) and then goes on to a chapter talking about the extreme stress of pigs living in a slaughterhouse environment and the possibility of giving them anti-anxiety medication. I know this was a book about human health and wellbeing but it didn't really sit right with me to tell the reader to include meat in a nutritious diet and then go on to describe the anxious and depressed animals that we slaughter. Especially in a book that was so stressed about climate change.
Anyway, overall I do just think it's good to read a book about focus once and a while to remind myself how much I care about it. Despite the societal focus, the author did have some good personal takeaways and I have enjoyed spending time on walks, gardening, and working away from my phone.
I haven't torn through a book this quickly in quite a while. The concept is compelling and thought provoking and I was invested in all of the main characters and political maneuvering. Not quite 5 stars because I just needed a little more detail about the world. How do they decide how many people need culled? Why the hell is there not some kind of age minimum? Is the purpose population control or instilling some small sense of mortality? If it's the former, this system would have almost no effect on the exponential growth caused by people having multiple generations of children without ever dying, and their children doing the same, and their children doing the same. The concept of a post death and aging world is really fascinating and I just wish the author had dug a tiny bit deeper with the idea.
It was pretty gripping but left me with a lot of questions. The whole scheme seemed pretty dumb/illegal. I also thought it was pretty obvious that there would be a big twist because the whole plot didn't really make sense without something to fill in some blanks. It did make me want to read some more thrillers/mysteries.
This book sounds a little silly and I probably wouldn't have picked it up if it weren't from such a glowing review from Kate, but wow did I get so sucked in. The chess competitions were actually really fun and Nolan being obsessed with getting to play chess against Mallory again was really cute. I'm curious what someone who actually knew how to play chess would have thought of the game descriptions - they managed to keep me entertained despite knowing almost nothing. My main complaint was that there was a lot of build up about Mallory's chess-related trauma that made her swear off chess forever and the reason didn't really make much sense to me.
Side note, the fact that when Mallory came into some money she was able to afford better treatment for her mom's chronic illness which allowed her mom to start working and supporting the family again was a really glowing review of the American social safety net and healthcare system.
I was a little hesitant to read this after the disappointing Nico spinoff, but this really captured the voice of Percy while also aging the characters up in a way that was believable but still middlegrade appropriate. It was just a fun, low-stakes adventure with some favorite characters. There was also an internal monologue about aging that gave me goosebumps and almost made me cry. I also hope it shows any young boys who read this how much you should respect and admire your girlfriend. Anyway, it was just nice seeing these characters “all grown up.”
My favorite of this series of short (normal length) books by Brandon Sanderson. Really bizarre and interesting premise, nice characters. Was it intended to be an allegory about the dangers of AI art? I definitely think so. Can Brandon Sanderson write a convincing romance plot? This book moved me from “no” to “sort of” - I still didn't notice any chemistry but I did think the characters were genuinely good and suited for each other.
Not sure why I read another book about wealthy people. I liked all the parts about Rachel and Nick's relationship and Rachel's fish-out-of-water experience, but all the gossip and hand-wringing about family lines got a little tedious. It was sort of fascinating, but not really as funny as I thought it was claiming to be. I do definitely want to watch the movie now and see all the decadence brought to life.
I love a romance where the impediments to the relationship are mostly external and not entirely based on terrible communication skills, even if the premise is absurd. Also some of the most nuanced discussions about sexuality (especially asexuality) that I've read in fiction. The main characters were very sweet and very nerdy, but not in an over-the-top, pop culture references every 5 seconds way. Such a fun and nice binge and kind of what I needed to read after the depressing Fleishman is in Trouble. It was so close to being a 5 star book, but one of the main characters manages to avoid learning critical information in a way that is so unbelievable as to slightly mar the ending for me. Still, one of the best romcoms I've read.