Sequoia Nagamatsu: How High We Go in the Dark

 Hi everyone

This is my review for Sequoia Nagamatsu's How High We Go in the Dark. I got my copy from Bol.com and it has this gorgeous cover that totally sucked me in when I saw it online. And then I read the blurb and the book was instantly added to my cart.

"Dr. Cliff Miyashiro arrives in the Arctic Circle to continue his recently deceased daughter's research, only to discover a virus, newly unearthed from melting permafrost. The plague unleashed reshapes life on earth for generations. Yet even while struggling to counter this destructive force, humanity stubbornly persists in myriad moving and ever inventive ways.
Among those adjusting to this new normal are an aspiring comedian, employed by a theme park designed for terminally ill children, who falls in love with a mother trying desperately to keep her son alive; a scientist who, having failed to save his own son from the plague, gets a second chance at fatherhood when one of his test subjects-a pig-develops human speech; a man who, after recovering from his own coma, plans a block party for his neighbours who have also woken up to find that they alone have survived their families; and a widowed painter and her teenaged granddaughter who must set off on cosmic quest to locate a new home planet.
From funerary skyscrapers to hotels for the dead, How High We Go in the Dark follows a cast of intricately linked characters spanning hundreds of years as humanity endeavours to restore the delicate balance of the world. This is a story of unshakable hope that crosses literary lines to give us a world rebuilding itself through an endless capacity for love, resilience and reinvention. Wonderful and disquieting, dreamlike and all too possible."

I loved this book. It's a collection of interlinked stories centered around this plague and how the world and specific people tried to cope with it. It's focused on the people and their lives and not on action, war, crime, ...
It's thoughtful, hopeful, bleak, harrowing and tender.

How High We Go in the Dark is a slow read, the prose is beautiful and elegant, the story flows easily in a dreamy, meditative way. Because of this and the heaviness of the stories I couldn't read it for two hours at a time; I had to take pauses to digest what I had read. To ponder over the characters and the stories. And that's a sign I love a book.

Happy reading!
Helena

 

Richard K. Morgan: Altered Carbon

 Hi everyone

 I've been hearing a lot about Richard K. Morgan's Altered Carbon so I wanted the find out what the buzz is about. I read this on my e-reader.

"In the twenty-fifth century, humankind has spread throughout the galaxy, monitored by the watchful eye of the U.N. While divisions in race, religion, and class still exist, advances in technology have redefined life itself. Now, assuming one can afford the expensive procedure, a person’s consciousness can be stored in a cortical stack at the base of the brain and easily downloaded into a new body (or “sleeve”) making death nothing more than a minor blip on a screen.
Ex-U.N. envoy Takeshi Kovacs has been killed before, but his last death was particularly painful. Dispatched one hundred eighty light-years from home, re-sleeved into a body in Bay City (formerly San Francisco, now with a rusted, dilapidated Golden Gate Bridge), Kovacs is thrown into the dark heart of a shady, far-reaching conspiracy that is vicious even by the standards of a society that treats “existence” as something that can be bought and sold. For Kovacs, the shell that blew a hole in his chest was only the beginning. . . ."

This was ok.
The premise was interesting, sort of 'saving' your consciousness and then downloading it into a different body. That has great potential.
It turned out to be a rather generic detective story with quite a few sidethings going on.

Honestly, I really didn't care for any of it. The story, the characters, the world.
The writing wasn't bad and I can see why people like it. Lots of action, stern action-hero MC, detective work. Just not my thing.

Happy reading
Helena

N. K. Jemisin: The Killing Moon

 Hi everyone

Well this book took me a long time to finish reading. I loved N. K. Jemisin's The Broken Earth series so I was very hopeful for this story but it really fell short.

The Killing Moon is the first book in the Dreamblood duology. I got my copy from Bol.com. 

"In the ancient city-state of Gujaareh, peace is the only law. Upon its rooftops and among the shadows of its cobbled streets wait the Gatherers - the keepers of this peace. Priests of the dream-goddess, their duty is to harvest the magic of the sleeping mind and use it to heal, soothe...and kill those judged corrupt.
But when a conspiracy blooms within Gujaareh's great temple, the Gatherer Ehiru must question everything he knows. Someone, or something, is murdering innocent dreamers in the goddess's name, and Ehiru must now protect the woman he was sent to kill - or watch the city be devoured by war and forbidden magic."

The story was sooooo slow. And not because there was amazing worldbuilding or the characters had wonderful depth. I still had a lot of questions about the magic and the world that were left unanswered. The characters stayed very much the same, I felt like they didn't grow or develop much past the start of the novel. And there wasn't much depth to them to start with.

Because I loved N. K. Jemisin's The Broken Earth series so much I will try something else but it will not be the second book in this duology.

Happy reading
Helena

Lucy Holland: Sistersong

 Hi everyone

I just finished Sistersong by Lucy Holland. The book has a gorgeous cover but I read it on my e-reader.
It's only 360 pages but it felt longer.

"Inspired by the dark folk ballad “The Two Sisters”, interweaving the perspective of a third sibling that history forgot, Sistersong is a rich and lyrical tale in the tradition of Circe and The Bear and the Nightingale—the story of three daughters of a pagan king who each have their own magical gift, and their own price to pay, when war comes to their land.
In the ancient kingdom of Dumnonia, there is old magic to be found in the whisper of the wind, the roots of the trees, the curl of the grass. King Cador knew this once, but now the land has turned from him, calling instead to his three daughters. Riva can cure others, but can’t seem to heal her own deep scars. Keyne battles to be seen for who she truly is—the king’s son. And Sinne dreams of seeing the world, of finding love and adventure.
All three fear a life of confinement within the walls of the hold, their people’s last bastion of strength against the invading Saxons. However, change comes on the day ash falls from the sky. It brings with it Myrdhin, meddler and magician. And Tristan, a warrior whose secrets will tear them apart.
Riva, Keyne and Sinne—three sisters entangled in a web of treachery and heartbreak, who must fight to forge their own paths.
Their story will shape the destiny of Britain."

I was really looking forward to this but it fell quite short of my expextations. 

 

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The writing was ok, a bit simple though not overly so. But the writing is too contemporary for the setting, the dialogue, the characters are all written in modern day English, with modern ideas that don't fit in this historical setting. I'm not sure religion and tolerance were so deeply questionned or accepted back then.
My main problems were the convenience of the magic and the characters. The workings of the magic and the timing were a too perfect fit for the story. When it works or doesn't, who can do what. All way too convenient to fit what's going on and where Holland wants the story to go.
Now about the characters. All three sisters read like teenagers, especially the drama between them and the romantic aspect all three have. Mother and father have no depth, neither do the priest and the magician. Everyone is very one-sided.
As important; in my opinion Keyne should have stayed a woman and become the strong confident independent warrior she really is. Or she should have come into her own as a man but not a warrior. To combine them both made it too much of a stereotype wherein the man is the fighter and leader and the woman stays meek. As if she can only be a warrior is she's a man.
This really took down the book for me. 

It's not a great fantasy novel because it tries to be historical but it's not an amazing historical novel either because of the anachronistic writing.

I wouldn't recommend reading this.

Happy reading
Helena

Yuval Noah Harari: Sapiens

 Hi everyone

This is my review for Yuval Noah Harari's book Sapiens. I read my husbands copy. 

"100,000 years ago, at least six human species inhabited the earth. Today there is just one. Us. Homo sapiens.
How did our species succeed in the battle for dominance? Why did our foraging ancestors come together to create cities and kingdoms? How did we come to believe in gods, nations and human rights; to trust money, books and laws; and to be enslaved by bureaucracy, timetables and consumerism? And what will our world be like in the millennia to come?
In Sapiens, Dr Yuval Noah Harari spans the whole of human history, from the very first humans to walk the earth to the radical – and sometimes devastating – breakthroughs of the Cognitive, Agricultural and Scientific Revolutions. Drawing on insights from biology, anthropology, palaeontology and economics, he explores how the currents of history have shaped our human societies, the animals and plants around us, and even our personalities. Have we become happier as history has unfolded? Can we ever free our behaviour from the heritage of our ancestors? And what, if anything, can we do to influence the course of the centuries to come?
Bold, wide-ranging and provocative, Sapiens challenges everything we thought we knew about being human: our thoughts, our actions, our power ... and our future."

This was really, really interesting. I enjoyed every second. So many things to think about and connections I didn't see before. It's incredibly engrossing. Things I knew about were put into a new light or a different perspective and every chapter made me think about our history and future.
The book is easy to read and definitely written for non-scientists but it's not sensational or dramatic either. It's unbiased, it sticks to facts and whenever he speculates he states so clearly.

Highly recommended.

Happy reading!
Helena    

Stephen King: Pet Sematary

 Hi everyone

I finally read one of Stephen King's absolute classics; Pet Sematary. And what a ride it was!
I got my copy from Bol.
You can find all my Stephen King reviews here.

" The house looked right, felt right, to Dr Louis Creed.

Rambling, old, unsmart and comfortable. A place where the family could settle; the children grow and play and explore. The rolling hills and meadows of Maine seemed a world away from the fume-choked dangers of Chicago.

Only the occasional big truck out on the two-lane highway, grinding up through the gears, hammering down the long gradients, growled out an intrusive note of threat.

But behind the house and away from the road: that was safe. Just a carefully clear path up into the woods where generations of local children have processed with the solemn innocence of the young, taking with them their dear departed pets for burial.

A sad place maybe, but safe. Surely a safe place. Not a place to seep into your dreams, to wake you, sweating with fear and foreboding... "

 

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This was sooo heavy. Especially now I have children (3 years and 7 years) it really hit me differently. The moment Gage dies and every word after chilled me to the bone. Before this scene the book was good but not amazing. But after his death it turns really dark and terrifying. It's horror but in a psychological way, it makes you doubt yourself and question how you would react, how your sanity would fare.

The writing is perfect for this novel. It's easy to read, atmospheric, there's a chill in the air from the first chapter and it's hard to put down. I did though, and frequently too because I felt chilled, short of breath and terribly sad. 

The last 50 or so pages were absolutely mental.

Happy reading!
Helena