octavia_cade's Reviews (2.64k)

This book takes place very early on after Voyager arrived in the Delta Quadrant; it seems as if they've been there only a matter of months. I can't be bothered to look up the date of publication, but it seems as if it were written, as well as set, early on in the show's run, because the characterisation is a little off in places. This actually works to the benefit of one character, as Neelix, when featured, come across as a great deal more competent than he ever appeared in the show. If only this presentation of him had been the norm!

The Final Fury has primarily an action storyline that works fairly well, I think, although the ending is a bit weak. It took a while to get going as well, but by about a third of the way in I was solidly engaged and stayed that way until the end. I think what I'm most struck by, though, is the tone - especially in that first third. There, it almost felt like a sort of bastard mash-up of Star Trek and the Black Library. I actually looked up the author to see if he'd ever written for them, but no. It was a bit of an uncomfortable mix, at times; I love the Trek franchise because it is so ultimately hopeful, and because it works to find commonalities between species. The first book in this mini-series did that very well, if ultimately tragically, but it seems to have dropped off entirely here. 

This is an exhaustively researched book, and no detail is too small for Wright to include. On the one hand, this can be extremely interesting, as details on hedge construction and ecology - liberally interspersed with photographs - give a well-rounded summary of hedges in the UK. I'm forced to admit, though, that by the end I was slogging through it, wondering how much more there could possibly be, and it's entirely possible that, by the final chapter, I had entirely hit my limit on hedges. I'm not sure if it's more or less helpful that my own country doesn't really have the same history of hedgerows, so a lot of what I'm reading is only vaguely familiar, reminiscent as it was of the times I worked in country pubs on my OE. Perhaps if more of them were out my own front door I'd be slightly more fascinated. As it was, the lengthy middle section on species found in hedgerows left me glazed over more than once.

That being said, I was genuinely compelled by the arguments for species abundance, how the type and height of a hedge affected this, and the parallels to woodland edges. So, all in all, despite some slumpy bits, it was well worth reading in the end. 

Oh, fuck it. Generally, I've kept my shelf classification to the typical definition of a romance; one that has a happy-ever-after ending, or at least a happy-for-now. But I think it might be time to expand that. I've just made my way to the RWA site and had another look at their definition, and it includes two things: a central love story, and an emotionally satisfying and optimistic ending. And you know what, I think this counts. Me Before You doesn't have the typical happy ending, as one of the central pairing actually dies (I don't think it's a spoiler to say so at this point). But they die on their own terms, at peace with their decision, and more importantly, supported by their partner, who is in turn supported by them. The ending is hopeful.

I think what I like about this best is the idea that love is sometimes not enough. Will is loved by Louisa, and by his family, and it's not enough to make his life bearable. It just isn't. Constant pain, eternal incapacity... his life is a misery, and he's loved, and both these things can be true at the same time. One doesn't make the other less important, and I was glad that both these things were treated respectfully. 

I read and reviewed the four comics collected here separately, so this is really just for my own records. The collection rating is an average of the individual ratings: issues one and four earned three stars from me, whereas both middle issues only got one star. It's a rating, I think, that's directly related to the villains. They're monstrously violent and it's shown in horrible detail and sometimes I feel, when I read comics, that the creators are trying to outdo each other in a race to portray the most sadism. It's awful to say, but as the horror went on, I was actually surprised to see no sexual assault, because usually that's the next rung on the misery ladder. That's how low my expectations have fallen for certain types of horror, which is a shame. When Basilisk focuses on the hero, and the once-villain who is clearly repentant, I'm interested. When it's gleefully cataloguing the depredations of its nasty antagonists, however, I sincerely don't give a damn. 

First, I have to admit, of the five novels analysed here I have read precisely none, so my reaction is likely coloured by that. On the one hand I wonder if I might have found it a little more compelling if I were familiar with the source material, but on the other... I'm not honestly sure that I want to read the source material. Most of it sounds unpleasant. Which is absolutely the point, as novels about 9/11 are hardly likely to be easy reads, but the only one I think I'd consider picking up is Lynne Sharon Schwartz's The Writing on the Wall. Olson has articulated well why he thinks critical reaction to these novels has been less than satisfactory, and he is convincing in his arguments, but still...

Even with my ignorance, though, parts of this were fascinating. I kind of changed my mind on it partway through, as I'm used to my ghost stories being a little more overt in their ghostliness, whereas a lot of what Olson is talking about here is Gothic trauma and how it nudges up against the supernatural, and not always in expected ways. Once I stopped thinking about this as a critical exploration of very-little-ghosts and started thinking of it as an exploration of the destabilising effects of trauma (which is probably what the author intended) I started to get a lot more interested. The actual phenomenon of survivors taking on attributes of the dead, in their mannerisms and behaviour, for instance, is an example of this, producing an amalgamation that's arguably part doppelganger and part possession, which is a genuinely fascinating take. The whole is clearly well-researched and for the most part clearly written, not over-burdened with academic prose, which is also a bonus.

It should be said that I received a free e-copy of this book for voting purposes in the Bram Stoker awards. I was glad to get it, and it seems churlish to complain, but I think it's fair to say that the version I received had yet to be copy-edited. It loses half a point for that. I suspect this will be fixed in the final version. 

I enjoyed this. There's a very effective juxtaposition here between ecological and human injustice, although I suppose it isn't a juxtaposition really. Exploitation of living creatures is exploitation of living creatures, and while I know historical treatments of human biology have often led to some demographics being treated as closer to animals than others, I think that we can still be disgusted by mistreatment of each and there's no exclusive limit on that. (Unfortunately so, as I'd like to entertain a great deal less disgust than I do, but alas.) That being said, I often found the poems about animals here to be more affecting than the poems about people. Perhaps because those animals appeared more individualised? The images of the elephants in particular... There's some interesting crossover, however, as in the poem "the bear" where a displaced bear is processed as if he was a refugee. It's really all constructed very cleverly. 

Short, fun little story about Harry Dresden rescuing a runaway kid and fighting with a troll. Most notable for the first meeting between him and Murphy, I believe. It's not very complex but it's still enjoyable, and the dissolution of the troll body is suitably weird. 

I was not expecting this to be at all funny, but it was. I wasn't expecting it because I've read a few of Forster's works by now, and you can call A Passage to India a great many things, but a barrel of laughs it was not. It was absolutely, cuttingly observant, and that facility for observation has here been applied to a central pair who are mildly ridiculous in their extreme youth and earnestness, as well as a supporting cast who are wildly, awfully ridiculous in the same way that Austen's Mr. Collins is ridiculous. The difference is that Forster supports his ridicule with a much kinder understanding of the skewered characters than Austen ever does with her painful little clergyman. Nearly everyone here has some moments where they become, even if only briefly, their better selves, and if I can't stand either Miss Bartlett or Cecil, both of whom would induce a desire for strangulation in a saint, they're still extremely well developed characters, portrayed with immense skill. Honestly, they're probably more carefully drawn than the central pair. 

Credit where it's due, this book is beautifully designed and presented. I think the cover, in particular, is amazing. The story itself, well - I liked it, and I appreciate that, for a novel, it's short and punchy. Sonny is a young teen who's lost his dad to suicide, and he and his mum, with few financial resources, end up living in a trailer in Oregon. The mother gets involved with a total loser, and Sonny himself makes a friend who is, in his own way, equally difficult: Death. Turns out Death is looking to find himself a replacement, and it all goes pretty much as you would expect. As I said, I liked it, but I did find the scattered moments of sadistic violence to be a turn-off. I'm not such a fan of sadistic violence, despite my love of horror, but if it's going to be there it should be absolutely necessary to the story, and the scene of Eugene torturing a cat, for instance, added nothing whatsoever. He's sufficiently nasty without this, and it never impacted the story in any other way (much like the old lady being tortured with a piece of chicken) and I'm just not here for it. 

Christy's off traveling in the Middle East, where she springs a surprise visit on an eccentric great-aunt and runs into her cousin. She hasn't seen the great-aunt since she was a child, and the aunt - living like Lady Muck out in an old and half-ruined palace - is distinctly weirder, and more suspicious, than Christy remembers. Turns out there's something dodgy going on in the ruins, and if you go into this hoping, as I did, for some sort of Hound of the Baskervilles vibe (to be fair the blurb did give me that impression) you'll be disappointed. There's nothing ghostly or supernatural going on here. 

The most disturbing thing is, frankly, the romance. It's between first cousins, so from the get-go it verges on incestuous, but so much is made of the fact that these two are routinely mistaken for twins that is goes straight past verging and into actual. I can't help but picture them, post-novel, married and being taken for siblings, which is not that appealing, frankly. I think it's also fair to say that the book is fairly slow-moving, and while the action does pick up near the end, a lot of it is Christy traveling to various places and having near misses with people she should be meeting, which is not all that exciting. It's a bit flabby in the middle, is what I'm saying, but it's still mildly entertaining.