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Lifelode

2021-10-29 00:00

Cover for Lifelode

Review:

Do­mes­tic fan­ta­sy is a thing?

I had nev­er even heard of this gen­re, but I would prob­a­bly read Jo Wal­ton's gro­cery list, so I did and I am hap­py to have done it.

There Is No Antimemetics Division

2021-10-12 00:00

Cover for There Is No Antimemetics Division

Review:

In­ter­est­ing. Not sure it makes ac­tu­al sense if pieced all to­geth­er, but goes down smooth­ly if not thought too much about.

How to Rule an Empire and Get Away with It (The Siege #2)

2021-10-05 00:00

Cover for How to Rule an Empire and Get Away with It (The Siege #2)

Review:

Are the char­ac­ters ni­hilis­tic, ca­su­al­ly cru­el, sex­ist? Sure. It's a prob­lem­at­ic book in that way.

The "this is Con­stantino­ple ex­cept where I need to change it to help the plot" is prob­lem­at­ic in its own way, too.

Is it some sort of "see, I am not racist be­cause I swapped peo­ple's colours around from the close his­tor­i­cal par­al­lel I am us­ing" crap? Oh yep.

BUT ... I read it in two days, it was fun. So make of that what you will, it's what it is.

Sixteen Ways to Defend a Walled City (The Siege #1)

2021-10-03 00:00

Cover for Sixteen Ways to Defend a Walled City (The Siege #1)

Review:

This was a ton of fun. I was won­der­ing why the tone sound­ed so fa­mil­iar when I saw "a pseu­do­nym for Tom Holt" and then I re­mem­bered I re­al­ly liked "Ex­pect­ing some­one taller", which he wrote.

Think of this book as sort of his­tor­i­cal fic­tion, but with­out all that sil­ly busi­ness of hav­ing to do re­search about his­to­ry and find­ing an event you have to learn a lot about and then have your plot fol­low rough­ly the out­line of what hap­pened.

Nah.

Just think: "Ro­man­s, Con­stantino­ple, siege, yep, sounds fun!" then write a book that ... sounds ro­man? Ex­cept ro­mans are maybe blue?

Read it in one day, al­ready start­ed on the sec­ond book.
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