Wants to read Hollywood, Ending
book
Rated Somewhere in France 6/10
If the relationship had occurred differently and if the pacing were tightened, I think I would have liked this book quite a bit. I’ve been reading and watching a lot of WWI and WWII content set in England lately, and I am interested for reasons I don’t yet fully know. Robson has a great love for historical subject matter, and it shows. Her insights into period details are very, very good, and the descriptions of the hospital and the war feel true, even coming from semi-naive Lilly. There’s an excellent book floating around in here, but as it stands, Somewhere in France is merely adequate.<br><br>(My full review appears at <a href="http://persephonemagazine.com/2014/02/book-review-somewhere-in-france-by-jennifer-robson/">Persephone Magazine</a>.)
Rated Automatic Noodle 10/10
I enjoyed this, a good look at what might happen not too far in the future. The robot characters are sympathetic.
Rated Another: A New York Times Bestselling Middle-Grade Horror Novel About an Inhuman Imposter for Kids 10/10
It's good to see that [a:Paul Tremblay|648612|Paul Tremblay|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1741528744p2/648612.jpg] can also do YA (or maybe it's middle grade actually) horror, too. Not much violence in this one but some creepy concepts, I'd like to see a TV/movie version.
Rated The Downloaded 2: Ghosts in the Machine 8/10
This was a pretty good follow up to the first one. It is short and it's mostly plot, with some kind of twist coming almost every chapter. Definitely more idea based than character based, although there are a few different viewpoint characters. I'm not sure if there needs to be a third one.
This was really great. Smart, interesting, accessible, but not dumbed-down. Definitely recommend.
Rated Silver Lining / UNIT: The Coup [Promo] 6/10
More of a 3.5, but I'm rounding down. The UNIT story is more of a jumping off point for further UNIT stories and isn't overly captivating on its own. The Bernice Summerfield story, on the other hand, does well with the short format and has a lot of humor as well.
Rated The Faith of Beasts 10/10
At least as good as the first one, possibly even better. You don't have to have read the short story set in the same world, but it does give interesting background information.
Rated The Fox Wife 6/10
I came across this book from a list at my local library and found the premise interesting. I think I did come into it with an expectation of more fable elements than what it turned out to be. I also thought there was going to be more skepticism and more of a hot pursuit of the main character, Snow, by the detective, Bao. Because I was expecting maybe more... blatant writing of Snow as a fox - or not - I read most of the way really wondering if she actually was a fox or if it was something all in her mind. Sure a couple of elderly people may or may not remember or think they knew about foxes, but how much of it was blurry memory from a lifetime ago from when they were small children?<br/><br/>I enjoyed this book well enough, but I felt more time was spent bowing and scraping to the whims of random men than making it more fantastical. Did Snow actually jump fences... as a woman? Somehow it never makes clear whether she's in a fox form or at least I didn't think so. The entire driving motivation of Snow is also rather anticlimactically resolved. I think I would've either preferred the fox aspect removed entirely or detailed more clearly. Middle-roading this detail made it less satisfying for me.
Rated Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI 8/10
I learned about this book because of the Lily Gladstone movie from a few years ago. Usually when a movie or show is based on a book, I try to read the book first. I can imagine how this book could be made into a dramatic movie, but hopefully sticks close to the book. I was glad to zip along through it because it was written in a very approachable way, not dry at all unlike many non-fiction books written about historic events/tragedies against Brown people.<br/><br/>When the who and how came about, I didn't quite realize it, though, because it was rather abrupt without a lot of flourish. Not to mention, there were still (I forget how many but maybe) 100 pages left! I was increasingly annoyed at the penultimate chapter because it spent so much time on the FBI agent who closed the case, Tom White. It got a little excessive, in my opinion.<br/><br/>The final chapter, though, was both great and terrible. It covered a lot of details outside of the main ones White had closed. It was all so infuriating in the mindblowing racism and genocidal behavior that I was glad it was all put into one chapter at the end. If it had been added throughout the book, I would've had to keep putting it down from blinding anger. Many many MANY more people should've ended up in prison than the one who did. What an embarrassing lack of justice.<br/><br/>I look forward to one day catching the movie and comparing it to the historical facts.
Rated Spread Me 8/10
Pretty weird and well written. It's short which works well for the story as it didn't need to be longer. I feel like some people might like this a lot more than I did.
Rated The Son 8/10
Some dark Scandinavian crime, mostly a revenge story -- some gruesome murders but also some heroism on the part of some of the characters, some twists and turns and I think a bit of a tie-in to one of the author's previous books.
Rated Trail of Lightning 10/10
This was a lot of fun. I was late to reading it because it looked a little bit like a somewhat formulaic YA book with the prickly heroine, but it has enough to distance itself from most of the similar books and I liked the combination of future post-apocalypse with indigenous mythology.
Rated Hamnet 6/10
I got on a very long wait list for this book after I kept hearing an Oscar-nominated film was based on it. I'm into some historical fiction and I thought it would be an interesting POV from Shakespeare's wife for a change, even though maybe/probably most of it was fiction hung up on a handful of facts.<br/><br/>A relatively slim novel, it took me a while to get through it still. I have to say that I was disappointed. I kept waiting for maybe a little more colorful writing? Maybe more characterization? I can't quite pinpoint my issue, but I didn't feel I got a whole lot out of it.<br/><br/>I like reading books on which a film is based first, so I'm going to try that at some point, but I'm not racing to find it soon.<br/><br/>YMMV on how wrapped up you get in it as I've read in other reviews.