Sara's reading log

I am a book hoarder and reader. My main genre is SF, but I also love magic realism, fantasy and general fiction. Favorite authors are Iain M. Banks, Ursula K. LeGuin, Haruki Murakami, José Saramago, Isaac Asimov, Ben Aaronovitch and more. My rating system is based on five stars. I rate books based on my expectations and what a books aims to be. This means that the brilliant 'Fahrenheit 451' gets five stars because I thought it would be good, people said it was good, and it was good, but 'A Closed and Common Orbit' also gets five stars because in its series, in its style, I really enjoyed it and was not disappointed.

Among others by Jo Walton

  • Started on: 2013-10-05
  • Finished on: 2013-10-06
  • Read in: English
  • Rating: *****
  • Genre(s): Science Fiction

This book has two special stories. One is about a world of magic, with good and evil magic, where one girl, Mori, loses her twin sisters and flees her mother by going to a boarding school, thereby moving from magical Wales to a lot less magical England. Another is about that same girl trying to get through her teens, surviving partly because of her love of science fiction novels. As this is set in the seventies, we are talking about some major writers here, like Roger Zelazny (the Amber series is just coming out) and Ursula Le Guin.
The book was nominated for and has won many awards (it won the Nebula, Hugo, BFS and was nominated for the Locus, Mythopoeic and WFA). And I can see why. Both elements of the story drew me in and kept me reading. In one way, I recognized myself in Mori, with her love of books and science fiction. I have a fondness for the works of that period, and I am slowly discovering them, picking them up second-hand in thrift shops or from old collectors. I savor them, knowing I have some master pieces on my shelves waiting to be read. I looked up the list of works mentioned in this novel, and while I won’t go for completion in reading and collecting them (those novels are not necessarily the best or even good, just around in that period), it is lovely inspiration. The magical elements were a nice mix between classical ‘facts’ (the existence of fairies’) and originality. All in all just a very good, strong book. Five out of five stars.

  • Started on: 2013-10-05
  • Finished on: 2013-10-06
  • Read in: English
  • Rating: *****
  • Genre(s): Science Fiction

This book has two special stories. One is about a world of magic, with good and evil magic, where one girl, Mori, loses her twin sisters and flees her mother by going to a boarding school, thereby moving from magical Wales to a lot less magical England. Another is about that same girl trying to get through her teens, surviving partly because of her love of science fiction novels. As this is set in the seventies, we are talking about some major writers here, like Roger Zelazny (the Amber series is just coming out) and Ursula Le Guin.
The book was nominated for and has won many awards (it won the Nebula, Hugo, BFS and was nominated for the Locus, Mythopoeic and WFA). And I can see why. Both elements of the story drew me in and kept me reading. In one way, I recognized myself in Mori, with her love of books and science fiction. I have a fondness for the works of that period, and I am slowly discovering them, picking them up second-hand in thrift shops or from old collectors. I savor them, knowing I have some master pieces on my shelves waiting to be read. I looked up the list of works mentioned in this novel, and while I won’t go for completion in reading and collecting them (those novels are not necessarily the best or even good, just around in that period), it is lovely inspiration. The magical elements were a nice mix between classical ‘facts’ (the existence of fairies’) and originality. All in all just a very good, strong book. Five out of five stars.