akallabeth's reviews
225 reviews

The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin

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challenging hopeful reflective slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

deservedly a classic, what else is there to say? the fact that this is so compelling and engaging while being at least 70% political treatise and philosophical debate is a marvel. while not quite as emotionally intense as the left hand of darkness (a book that made me cry), the characters still feel and act like real people, something you should not take for granted when it comes to classic scifi. and for all the meaty sociopolitical debate, i actually don't think the language in this book is overly dense or impenetrable. ms le guin your brain was unimaginably massive. thanks for the books. 

 A thin, small, middle-aged man beside Trepil began speaking, at first so softly, in a voice hoarsened by the dust-cough, that few of them heard him. He was a visiting delegate from the Southwest miners' syndicate, not expected to speak on this matter. "... what men deserve," he was saying. "For we each of us deserve everything, every luxury that was ever piled high in the tombs of the dead Kings, and we each of us deserve nothing, not a mouthful of bread in hunger. Have we not eaten while another starved? Will you punish us for that? Will you reward us for the virtue of starving while others ate? No man earns punishment, no man earns reward. Free your mind of the idea of deserving, the idea of earning, and you will begin to be able to think." 

Pyramids by Terry Pratchett

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adventurous funny medium-paced
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No

3.0

this has a very fun beginning and a very strong ending/final quarter, but the middle drags. parts read like an early draft of small gods; a solid first draft, mind, but small gods is still a much stronger book, so it's not a comparison that really works for pyramids. nevertheless - at least rincewind is not here. i shall count that particular blessing while i still have it.
The Seas by Samantha Hunt

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emotional mysterious reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

 
When you are young, living in the North, sadness can make you feel like you have something to do. Sadness can be like a political cause, almost, or a religion or a drug habit. It is a lot of work to stay sad. I think of the carny girl's teardrops and I can't believe that is her purpose, but still I want a purpose so badly that I am envious of even that sad and ugly purpose she has.


provisional rating, but i enjoyed this; mournful magical realism about girls who feel stuck is very for me. and sea stories, too. 
Ljeta s Marijom by Olja Savičević Ivančević

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medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.25

 
U obiteljskim pričama Marijola je ostjetila da je tuga elementarna i duboka, a da je radost neka vrsta nefiltrirane spontanosti, izostanak potrebe sa uljepšavanjem i humorom, i da su mračne, teško shvatiljive nesreće iskustvo koje pretječe ljude - višak sudbine. Previše sudbine, rekle su joj Marije i uzdahnule. Previše sudbine za jednu obitelj.


jedna klasična multigeneracijska (i prilično autobiografska, čini mi se) mini saga, u balkanskom izdanju. kao što to uglavnom bude, nisu sve marije bile jednako interesantne, ali na momente to sve bude lepo i dirljivo. 

meni omiljena - maša, možda zato što me podseća najviše na moju baku. manje interestantna - marijola (bez uvrede autorki, s obizrom da mi se čini da je to njena marija), ali ajde, možda zato što me je najviše izdeprimirala. ili mi je ona nekako najbliža bila, iako nismo isto godište (ja sam iz nesrećne '93, između marijoline '74 i marine '02, tako da moje marije baš i nema, ali sve mi nekako marijola bliskija ispala) pa mi pokvarila eskapizam. a možda me i nerviraju knjige o piscima i knjigomoljicma. ko će ga znati!

za kraj ću napomenuti da je knjiga baš pošteno testirala moje znanje srpskohrvatskog (a i vala italijanskog) jezika, hvala drugovi dalmatinici. (bez sakrazma ironije itd, baš onako okrepljujuće iskustvo.) 
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Elena Knows by Claudia Piñeiro

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challenging reflective sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

very good, and very difficult to read. 

elena, an elderly widow with parkinson's, is trying to get to the bottom of her daughter rita's death, convinced it couldn't possibly have been suicide, like everyone's claiming. 

though there is a mystery element to this story, the author is really using this framework to examine questions of bodily autonomy, specifically for women. what happens when your body is no longer your own? when the decisions about how and what you can use it for are taken out of your hands; by men, the church, the government, chronic illness. by other women acting as enforcers. the complicated relationships between women are drawn especially vividly and compellingly. the most gut-churning scene in the book by far
is the one where rita forcibly prevents a distressed stranger from going through with her abortion. i literally felt nausea, which i say as a compliment.


well worth a read, but be careful, especially if you're sensitive to discussions of disability and reproductive rights in particular. 
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Kindred by Octavia E. Butler

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challenging dark emotional reflective tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated

4.5

the octavia e. butler experience is that you zip through the book because it's so readable and written in a deceptively simple way and the pacing is excellent, and then you sit quietly thinking about it for 2-3 business days feeling kind of nauseous. she was such a master at making the reader confront complicated and unpleasant concepts, never sugarcoating but also never relying on cliche or cheap emotional manipulation. this is my second book of hers, and i can't wait to read the rest.
Off by Momo Kapor

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reflective fast-paced

3.5

 
Traži se jedan svet, prekjuče iščezao.


jugoslovenski autori i nostalgija, pa name a more iconic duo.
A Small Place by Jamaica Kincaid

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reflective medium-paced
a brutal & no-nonsense essay about life in antigua - kincaid covers the legacies of colonialism and slavery, government corruption, and the ills of tourism. there's tons of fascinating information scattered throughout, but i think it's worth noting before you go in that this is less a history book or a social justice treatise, and more a personal narrative. kincaid's writing is largely unsentimental, but her personal feelings shine through strongly - and she is very, very angry. 

i don't really rate non-fiction on here, but i would recommend this; it's sharply written, compellingly structured, and provides an interesting perspective that's very much worth engaging with.

But nothing can erase my rage – not an apology, not a sum of money, not the death of the criminal – for this wrong can never be made right, and only the impossible can make me still: can a way be found to make what happened not have happened?
Equal Rites by Terry Pratchett

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funny medium-paced

3.0

ish. definite improvement over the colour of magic/the light fantastic, both conceptually and stylistically, but still very meandering. as always the early wizards are a big ol' nothing, just a rotating cast of totally interchangeable caricatures. it's hard to care about characters like simon and cutangle when i know damn well i'll never see them again. granny weatherwax is already recognisable in this first appearance, though clearly not the same character. this may be mildly blasphemous, but i wish terry had kept some of the early installment characterisation (ie, her ability to occasionally be softer to esk, and crucially her ability to be a little wrong/out of her depth, lol).

finally i do not feel that terry satisfactory resolves the witch/wizard gender divide in this book, nor any of the other books i've read so far, but there's many books to go. we'll see. 

next up: my loop back continues, and it's time for pyramids.i'm keeping my expectations low.
Chlorine by Jade Song

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tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.0

 fun concept, disappointing execution.

the writing is so clunky; it manages to be both unbearably on the nose and so convoluted as to obscure meaning, often in the same paragraph. this is some sort of achievement i suppose, but not one that makes for a fun reading experience. it totally buried any other literary merit the book may have had for me.

body horror: medium. or i have a stronger stomach than i thought.
sapphism: medium to low, and by the end i sort of wished there hadn't been any.
cover: infuriatingly cool, and will probably persuade me to keep this book in my collection longer than i should.