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[skygiants]

OK, last post I'll make today, I promise, but here's my annual books read post for 2018!

As always, I would hypothetically like to post in the future about everything on this list that I haven't talked about yet, and as always it's probably not going to happen, so if you would like me to talk about anything in particular drop a comment here and I will either prioritize it for a near-future post or expound upon it in a reply.

Books read, 2018:

1. October: The Story of the Russian Revolution, China Miéville
2. After Anatevka, Alexandra Silber
3. The Bedlam Stacks, Natasha Pulley
4. Baccano 1932: Drug and the Dominos, Ryohgo Narita
5. Contact, Carl Sagan
6. The Disaster Artist: My Life Inside the Room, The Greatest Bad Movie Ever Made, Greg Sistero and Tom Bissell
7. Daughter of Mystery, Heather Rose Jones
8. The Creation of Anne Boleyn, Susan Bardo
9. Never Trust a Dead Man, Vivian Vande Velde
10. Cruising to Danger, Priscilla Hagon
11. Baccano 2001: The Children of Bottle, Ryohgo Narita
12. Baccano 1933: The Slash: Cloudy to Rainy, Ryohgo Narita
13. The Forbidden Rose, Joanna Bourne
14. The Alice Network, Kate Quinn
15. Ruin of Angels, Max Gladstone
16. A Fashionable Indulgence, KJ Charles
17. Archivist Wasp, Nicole Kornher-Stace
18. The Ruin of a Rake, Cat Sebastian
19. The Cookbook Collector, Allegra Goodman
20. Miss Kopp's Midnight Confessions, Amy Stewart
21. The Black Hawk, Joanna Bourne
22. Wanted, A Gentleman, KJ Charles
23. Pale Rider: The Spanish Flu of 1918 and How It Changed the World, Laura Spinney
24. Persona, Genevieve Valentine
25. The Gammage Cup, Carol Kendall*
26. Rogue Spy, Joanna Bourne
27. Madam, Will You Talk?, Mary Stewart
28. The Covert Captain: Or, A Marriage of Equals, Jeannelle M. Ferreira
29. The Cinderella Deal, Jennifer Crusie
30. Trust Me on This, Jennifer Crusie
31. Stranger Than Truth, Vera Caspary
32. The Prince Commands: Being Sundry Adventures of Michael Karl, Sometime Crown Prince & Pretender to the Thrown of Morvania, Andre Norton
33. Icon, Genevieve Valentine
34. Savrola, Winston Churchill
35. Beauty Like the Night, Joanna Bourne
36. Velvet Shadows, Andre Norton
37. A Wrinkle in Time, Madeleine L'Engle
38. Their Finest, Lissa Evans
39. Touch Not the Cat, Mary Stewart*
40. A Hope Divided, Alissa Cole
41. Ninefox Gambit, Yoon Ha Lee
42. An Unkindness of Ghosts, Rivers Solomon
43. Jade City, Fonda Lee
44. Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda, Becky Albertelli
45. Swimmer Among the Stars, Kanishk Tharoor
46. Three Weeks With Lady X, Eloisa James
47. A Land So Strange: The Epic Journey of Cabeza de Vaca, Andrés Reséndez
48. Musketeer Space, Tansy Rayner Roberts
49. A Man Lay Dead, Ngaio Marsh
50. The Scarlet Pimpernel, Emma Orczy*
51. Words On Fire: The Unfinished Story of Yiddish, Dovid Katz
52. A Wizard of Earthsea, Ursula K. LeGuin*
53. The Elusive Pimpernel, Emma Orczy
54. Ammie, Come Home, Barbara Michaels
55. Enter a Murderer, Ngaio Marsh
56. The Hellfire Heritage, Willo Davis Roberts
57. From A Certain Point of View, ed. Elizabeth Shaefer
58. The Nursing Home Murder, Ngaio Marsh
59. The Raven Stratagem, Yoon Ha Lee
60. Binti, Nnedi Okorafor
61. Binti: Home, Nnedi Okorafor
62. Binti: The Night Masquerade, Nnedi Okorafor
63. Armistice, Lara Elena Donnelly
64. The Winter Prince, Elizabeth Wein*
65. Clone Wars Gambit: Stealth, Karen Miller
66. After the Wedding, Courtney Milan
67. I Will Repay, Baroness Emma Orczy
68. The Murderbot Diaries: Rogue Protocol, Martha Wells
69. A Princess in Theory, Alyssa Cole
70. A Seditious Affair, K.J. Charles
71. Witch, Barbara Michaels
72. Crazy Rich Asians, Kevin Kwan
73. The Edge, Dick Francis
74. Death in Ecstasy, Ngaio Marsh
75. Leah on the Offbeat, Becky Albertelli
76. A Gentleman's Position, K.J. Charles
77. Clone Wars Gambit: Siege, Karen Miller
78. Forget the Sleepless Shores, Sonya Taaffe
79. Eldorado, Baroness Orczy
80. Power and Majesty, Tansy Rayner Roberts
81. Exiled from Camelot, Cherith Baldry
82. Vintage Murder, Ngaio Marsh
83. Briarley, Aster Glenn Gray
84. The Friendly Young Ladies, Mary Renault
85. A Duke By Default, Alyssa Cole
86. Fair Peril, Nancy Springer*
87. That Lass O' Lowrie's, Frances Hodgson Burnett
88. The Poppy War, R.F. Kuang
89. A Coalition of Lions, Elizabeth Wein*
90. Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief, Lawrence Wright
91. The Sunbird, Elizabeth Wein*
92. The Clockwork Boys, T. Kingfisher
93. The Nun in the Closet, Dorothy Gilman
94. Record of a Spaceborn Few, Becky Chambers
95. The Lion Hunter, Elizabeth Wein*
96. The Empty Kingdom, Elizabeth Wein*
97. The Wonder Engine, T. Kingfisher
98. The Lawrence Browne Affair, Cat Sebastian
99. The Henchmen of Zenda, K.J. Charles
100. Revenant Gun, Yoon Ha Lee
101. The Ivy Tree, Mary Stewart*
102. Packing for Mars, Mary Roach
103. Lud-in-the-Mist, Hope Mirrlees
104. The Little Stranger, Sarah Waters
105. The Queen of Blood, Sarah Beth Durst
106. Artists in Crime, Ngaio Marsh
107. Sing for the Coming of the Longest Night, Iona Datt Sharma and Katherine Fabian
108. Eighty Days: Nellie Bly and Elizabeth Bisland's History-Making Race Around the World, Matthew Goodman
109. Unmasked by the Marquess, Cat Sebastian
110. Someone Is Killing The Great Chefs of Europe, Natasha and Ivan Lyons
111. Bury What We Cannot Take, Kirsten Chen
112. Monstrous Regiment, Terry Pratchett*
113. Matzoh Ball Gumbo: Culinary Tales of the Jewish South, Marcie Cohen Ferris
114. Death in a White Tie, Ngaio Marsh
115. Swordheart, T. Kingfisher
116. The Locked Corridor, Marilyn Ross
117. Lord Tony's Wife, Baroness Emmuska Orczy

Comics and graphic novels read, 2017:
1. Klezmer, Tome 2: Bon anniversaire, Scylla, Joann Sfar
2-5(?). Chang Ge Xing, Chapters 1-36, Da Xia

Definitely fewer books than last year, but more of them were new; only twelve rereads, which meant 105 new-to-me books, which is actually significantly more than last year! But of the new-to-me a significant chunk of those were the books I was chugging through on airplanes, including the Scarlet Pimpernel books, and the Ngaio Marsh mysteries, and all the many romance novels on this year's list. I definitely read more romance this year than any previous year, which I don't mind, but would like to have read more of other things as well. And I'm pretty sure only nine nonfiction books, despite all my resolve. More in the coming year!

Comments

[snickfic]

I would be interested to read your thoughts on any of these: A Wizard of Earthsea or A Wrinkle in Time. Also, thank you for the index! Now I'm going to go check out some of your blog posts that I missed. :)

[kore]

I'd love to hear you on Murderbot!

[aamcnamara]

Please talk to me about Ruin of Angels.

[krait]

Please talk about any/all of:

Monstrous Regiment
The Creation of Anne Boleyn
Pale Rider
anything/everything by T. Kingfisher


Or organisation methods, since I couldn't possibly come up with a list of books I read in 2018 and it's awesome that you keep track somehow. :D

[sovay]

What do the asterisks signify? Re-reads?

[edit] I would really enjoy hearing you talk about the Baccano novels.

[ambyr]

I would welcome your Daughter of Mystery thoughts!

[china_shop]

Not books, sorry, but did you watch any Kdramas that you haven't had a chance to write up yet? Just curious. :-)

[littledust]

I am intrigued by your thoughts on:

A Wrinkle in Time
After the Wedding
Crazy Rich Asians

[skygiants]

I am definitely going to write a whole Murderbot post as soon as I finish the fourth novella! SOON.

[skygiants]

I am hoping to do an Earthsea post once I reread the rest of the books in the series, but some brief thoughts for now: I remembered very little about this book (I have a LOT of impressions of Tombs of Atuan, but the first and third books didn't stick at all), and I was honestly surprised by how much I liked Ged and the book overall.

(bluestalking said when we were talking about it afterwards that she saw parallels between Ged's arc and Anakin Skywalker, and I've been turning that over in my head ever since.)

[snickfic]

...okay, now I need to reread it, clearly, so that I can consider these parallels. Because I'm right with you, my memories of Tombs of Atuan are pretty vivid, and I liked it a lot better. I kinda didn't care very much about Ged. But maybe on a reread?

[skygiants]

I was expecting to love this book and was surprised that it didn't make that much of an impression on me, even with all the lesbians AND the sibling stuff, both of which are generally instant draws for me -- I think maybe there was so much going on that it was hard for me to focus on and attach to any individual piece of the story. What did you think of it?

(My favorites of the sequence are still Three Parts Dead and Last First Snow.)

I do like whenever I can catch Max Gladstone doing a thing that's Very Boston and I remember having that feeling several times in the book although I could not tell you specifically where.

[skygiants]

I think I did posts on all of those but Pale Rider, but I will happily talk to you about that! My dad (an infectious disease doctor) recommended me that one and I thought it was a really solid examination -- it did a good job covering not just Europe and America, but the impact of the pandemic in a lot of regions that aren't necessarily discussed, as well as the impact it had on the study of disease afterwards. Not a quick or cheerful read, but a good and thorough one.

As far as organization - lol, the only way I do it is by creating a new DW entry for myself at the beginning of each year and carefully logging it every time I finish something, otherwise I would have no idea. And sometimes I leave it for a couple weeks and then try to catch up and get VERY CONFUSED and have to double-check my Kobo and library records to make sure I didn't miss something!

[skygiants]

The asterisks do signify rereads, yes! I should probably denote that somewhere...

Oh, I held off on posting about those because the second part of The Slash was going to be coming out, and now it is in fact out! I will acquire it and then write about all three. :D

[skygiants]

I think I was a bit unfair to Daughter of Mystery; it was sold to me as 'lesbian Ruritanian romance' and so I was expecting HIGH DRAMA and SWASHBUCKLING and IDENTITY SWAPS and instead I got a thoughtful lesbian fantasy of manners with a lot of worldbuilding and a few occasional swordfights and I was like "oh ... well, that's fine too...."

I still enjoyed it overall but I do not think it can be called Ruritanian and also I think that the timeline of events should probably have been shortened by at least a year, there was no particular reason for that book to go on as long as it did.

[seekingferret]

I read several other books on the 1918 flu this year, but not that one, so I'd love to hear your thoughts.

[skygiants]

Hmm .... oh, hey, did I really never write up Tree With Deep Roots? I DID NOT. I think technically I may have finished this last year, but it's the very dramatic one about the invention of the Korean alphabet - have you seen it?

genarti and I have also been very slowly watching Nirvana in Fire but we're only halfway through; I may do a post about it anyway though.

[skygiants]

A Wrinkle In Time - still struck by how all the bits that make the most impression on me (Flat Meg, IT making you think rhythmically, Meg using her anger) are the parts that didn't really make it into the film....

After the Wedding - oh I really wanted to like this one, but it super did not sell me on anything other than the fact that the leads were both very nice people and probably would have fallen in love with any other very nice people who happened to be in that situation

Crazy Rich Asians - I mostly enjoyed it but I liked the movie's handling of the mom so much better that in retrospect I'm like, hmmmm...

[skygiants]

It came as a rec from my dad, who's a doctor, so I expected it to be a very solid infectious disease book and it was; it was also a solid sociology book, which was a bonus. And very thorough in its handling of the flu as a really global pandemic, which others I've read have not been at all.

[ekaterinn]

Awesome list, and I'm enjoying reading through some of the reviews I missed!

I would also love to hear your thoughts on An Unkindness of Ghosts, if you have a chance, sometime, as I loved that book beyond reason.

[sovay]

(I have a LOT of impressions of Tombs of Atuan, but the first and third books didn't stick at all)

I'm not sure how it would have happened, but I really feel I read The Tombs of Atuan first and then went back in middle or even high school for Ged's story. I have a vivid association of the first edition cover art with my elementary school library.

[sovay]

Oh, I held off on posting about those because the second part of The Slash was going to be coming out, and now it is in fact out! I will acquire it and then write about all three.

Hooray!

[genarti]

I did the same thing: happened upon The Tombs of Atuan at the library, loved Arha and liked this Ged guy fine but was confused by the hints of backstory, and then went back and found A Wizard of Earthsea later. It took me longer to get into that one, but I loved it after I had.

The third book is the one that didn't really stick for me. I'm certain I read it, but I can't remember a thing about it. (Tehanu I know I never read, though I plan to.) I borrowed all three from my mom to reread sometime in the near future, though, so I hope I'll have more thoughts then.

[sovay]

The third book is the one that didn't really stick for me. I'm certain I read it, but I can't remember a thing about it.

It's a weird choice for the last of a then-trilogy: you get two coming-of-age stories and then one ending-of-life story without having had any intervening midlife. I like the dragon Kalessin.

(Tehanu I know I never read, though I plan to.)

I bounced badly off Tehanu when it came out and I still don't like it, but I think she needed to write it in order to write some of the later Earthsea fiction that I do enjoy, so I am fine with it existing.

I borrowed all three from my mom to reread sometime in the near future, though, so I hope I'll have more thoughts then.

I look forward.

[aella_irene]

I would like to hear your thoughts on the Cat Sebastians?

[china_shop]

I've heard of Tree With Deep Roots but no, haven't watched it yet.

I've heard so many good things about NiF, but since I'm learning Korean I'm trying to stick to Kdramas (barring the obvious *points to icon*). :-)

[sgac]

Looking at this, I think you must have been the person who made me buy Briarley. (I read reviews, I buy books, but I can never find the relevant review again.) Thank you for this book! It is my favorite BatB and has stuck with me for months rather than going straight out of my head.

[seekingferret]

I think that's a fair criticism of the books I've read- Crosby, whose project is all about doing a deep dive into the statistics, notes a few times that the deaths in India may have equalled the deaths in Europe, but because he couldn't get access to the quality of statistics he could in the US and Europe, he barely discusses that part of the outbreak.

Okay, now I'm interested in checking that out, thanks!

[sophia_sol]

I'd love to hear what you thought about the two Alyssa Cole books on your list (A Princess in Theory, and A Duke by Default)!

[larryhammer]

I've a lot of impressions of Tombs, in no small part because I reread that one the most, as a kid. It was Farthest Shore, however, that I attempted to file the serial numbers off, my second attempt as a fantasy novel as a teen. (The first attempt tried to file off The Silmarillion, natch.)

[genarti]

I would be interested to hear your thoughts about Persona and/or An Unkindness of Ghosts!

[genarti]

Briarley is so good, isn't it? I heard of it from a few people simultaneously, and I'm so glad I listened. It's just such a kind and charming take, in which every nagging "but why don't they just..." is addressed!

[ambyr]

That is an entirely fair reaction! I still mean to check out the sequels some day; I'm hoping moving beyond her debut means the author improves on pacing a bit, because, yes, Daughter of Mystery went on considerably longer than it had any right to.

[cinaed]

I read Pale Rider as well, and your thoughts are my thoughts!

I really liked the frank way the author went "This is not a comprehensive work because a lot of information was through missionaries and other less reliable sources but I didn't want to ignore those sections of the world, so I did my best."

It was definitely one of the best nonfiction books I've read in a while.

[littledust]

Ahahahahaha, re: After the Wedding! I liked it better than the first one in the Worth saga, but repetitive internal monologues did not a chemistry-filled romance make.

Re: Crazy Rich Asians, I liked the movie so much better than the book it was ridiculous! Part of my issue with the book is that, well, it really IS about HEY LOOK AT THESE CRAZY RICH ASIANS WHAT A WEIRD WORLD and not much more. Nick and Rachel seemed to have way more spark in the movie. PLUS THE MOVIE WAS NICER TO ASTRID AND ELEANOR.

[skygiants]

You're welcome - I hope you find it valuable!

[skygiants]

I'm glad you're enjoying the reviews! :D I had complicated feelings about Unkindness of Ghosts, which is one of the reasons I never ended up writing it up -- there were things it was doing that I really liked and other things that were difficult for me, but I also could tell some of the things about the book that were distancing for me were doing really important work for other readers, and I didn't feel like I was the right person to talk about any of those aspects. But I wish I'd been able to synthesize any of that usefully into a post, because I thought it was a really interesting book and would love to get other people to talk to me about it.

[skygiants]

I really enjoyed the first of the Cat Sebastians I read, which was The Ruin of a Rake, and did not like either subsequent book quite as well - The Lawrence Browne Affair seemed to kind of sand off all its characters' edges in the middle of the book to get them to fit smoothly together by the end, and I was sort of surprised to find that Unmasked by the Marquess was a full novel when I finished it because it had only felt like it had enough substance for a novella. But I would still read more Sebastians on planes.

[skygiants]

Oh, I'm so glad you found it and liked it! It's definitely now my favorite BatB as well - jumped straight into 'all-time comfort read' category without passing Go.

[skygiants]

I will probably do a full post on this series whenever the next one comes out; the short version is that I like the project of taking on 'surprise royalty' romance tropes and doing it in a way that simultaneously provides fun tropey wish-fulfillment starring women of color AND engages with the responsibilities of government, even though I've been lukewarm on both of the actual romance arcs. I liked Duke by Default better of the two, which I was not expecting.

[skygiants]

I wrote about Unkindness of Ghosts a few comments above! Persona and Icon ... hmm, I expected to like these more than I did because they're explicitly tapping into a lot of stuff I like and find interesting about celebrity culture and personalities constructed for the camera, but I actually think I would have liked it better if it hadn't been so heavily emphasized because it was all SO MUCH that my suspension of disbelief got a little shot. Even world leaders sometimes get to take vacations out of the public eye, much less ... diplomat/supermodels?

[skygiants]

NOT SO MUCH. I actually liked the first Worth Saga book better but I think that's partly because I was just SO EXCITED when Courtney Milan basically announced she was going to fix the Opium Wars ... and I am still excited for that! But this book did not do it!

The movie was MUCH nicer to Astrid but I did miss some of the additional personality she got in the book; I wanted some more wild fashion! Her outfits were all very nice but a bit staid! Hopefully maybe that will happen in movie 2. >.>

[skygiants]

It was interesting overall! Not an all-time favorite but it gave me a lot to think about and DESPERATELY made me want to read a good nonfiction book about the Korean alphabet. (And hey, if characters are going to die heroically, In Noble Service Of Grammar is a good way to go.)

That's a good reason to stick to kdramas!

[skygiants]

Yeah, I liked how upfront she was about what we do and don't know, and how she was able to pull some interesting analysis from the empty spaces as well as the things that were recorded.

[genarti]

Yeah, I find the premise of Persona (and Icon) fascinating, but I haven't yet read anything that makes me sure about whether I would like them or not. Maybe sometime I'll get around to reading them and find out!

[nextian]

Ooh, how were the Crusies?

[sophia_sol]

Ah, too bad about the lukewarm romance arcs! I've been so curious about the Princess in Theory one because it's very obviously about a fictionalized version of the country of Lesotho and nobody ever writes about Lesotho, but was wary of buying it because I haven't loved the one Alyssa Cole romance I've read.

[rmc28]

Hah, I came here to ask the same thing - my first reaction was "OOH, Crusies I haven't read" but yes, I would love to hear more about them.

[skygiants]

ohhh ... they weren't good. I'm pretty sure they were in fact bad. The first one was marginally better but in fact I remember very little about either of them except a sense of vague disappointment.