I did not mean to be away from this blog (and blogging in general) for quite so long!
Most of June-July was taken up by grading and work-related matters for my PhD/MA/final year undergrad supervisees etc. In August I’ve been focused on music practice, writing fiction and working on my individual/sole-authored research and research-writing since we have a way shorter semester break this time around. I also started a new (old) crafts hobby and have flung myself into embroidery.
I’ve been reading a whole lot! I’ve completed 67 books so far this year (not including the various monographs for research!) and am inching towards book #68 this weekend. I’ve enjoyed many magnificent novels and novellas lately. The standouts for me were Malka Older’s delightful Mossa and Pleiti books. Gaslamp detective hijinks on Jupiter? Yes please. Can’t wait for more. I also adored Amal El-Mohtar’s and Max Gladstone’s This Is How You Lose The Time War, and R.S.A Garcia’s Bishop’s Opening (in Clarkesworld). I finished Martha Well’s latest Murderbot book, Platform Decay and can’t wait to see what Murderbot gets embroiled in next. I also concluded my breathless exploration of Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan Novels and by the final novel was inwardly yelling at Lenu to get away from Nino.
Right now, I’m happily reacquainting myself with Ann Leckie’s Imperial Radch Trilogy before I move on to the books I have not read yet. I have copies of Provenance and Radiant Star (which I bought on my birthday) but sadly missed that there was a book in-between the two: Translation State. I don’t know if they have it in the store but I hope they do and that I can get to the store by the time I finish Provenance. I could buy an e-copy off Kobo but I would rather complete the physical copy set.
I’ve also nearly finished C. L. Clark’s The Faithless and will get The Sovereign (Book 3) off Kobo once I’m done. Really enjoying the novel which feels more fast-paced than The Unbroken. I thought about it and decided I love both books in different ways. The Unbroken was quite complex but really set out events plus the intricacies of the world well. What I really loved about it were the protagonists who messed up quite a bit. It was refreshing to watch them fail and grow. And then find their footing. The author certainly mastered the second novel format which is great because all of the things set up in Book 1 really takes off in Book 2. Amazing world-building and pacing.
Onwards to my epic Wheel of Time journey. I’m nearly coming to the end of the reread and am now at Book #11, Knife of Dreams. I did get into the first book that Brandon Sanderson wrote awhile back but not the rest. I’ll get back to WOT after I am done with the Leckie and Clark books. I’ve also been slowly going through George R.R. Martin’s Fire and Blood because of House of the Dragon which had me glued to the screen for weeks!
Incidentally, my main challenge in writing these posts is to ensure I do not overuse “read” . Since this is a post about reading books, that is quite daunting an endeavour indeed.