I’ll come clean: I only knew of this book because of the trailer for the film. I’d loved Rebecca, which I read last year, and thought I’d give this one a try as the trailer looked interesting and I wanted to read more of Du Maurier. It wasn’t exactly what I expected–but it was also better than expected. This book was absolutely fascinating and I adored it. I devoured it within a couple days, mesmerized. The story is told very much from the perspective of Philip Ashley, […]
More Tales of the Ketty Jay
In my last review, I talked about my experiences reading Retribution Falls, the first in a series of steampunk (or some similar -punk) novels about the pirate crew of the ship Ketty Jay. I have now read the rest of the books in the series, and will be reviewing them as a unit. Brief plot summaries of each book (each would work as a standalone adventure, I think, but of course it’s better to read them in order–and the last one relies more heavily on what has gone […]
Three tales of Agatha Christie
I had a browse in a used bookstore the other day and came away with three very cheap, old paperbacks of Agatha Christie, ones I either hadn’t read in ages and had forgotten or had somehow missed.They have been perfect reading just before bed; usually I read on my phone/kindle app but have been enjoying not staring into a screen just before I sleep. I will organize them in order of reading, as the first two were about the same in ranking–fairly solid Christie contributions without being […]
Retribution Falls: unlikable characters, very likable banter
A friend recommended this book to me, with the promise that it was hilarious, that his girlfriend kept reading lines aloud. He wasn’t wrong, and I found myself doing the same thing to my boyfriend. This is a light, fairly fast-paced read, and highly entertaining. The slight problem that I had with it was that the characters are, for the most part, extremely unlikable and unsympathetic. Now, I like morally difficult characters (cf. everyone in Game of Thrones except Jon Snow and Daenerys Stormborn). But […]
Solid fantasy with a comfortable feel
It has been months since I last reviewed a book! Shock, horror. Partly, it’s the fault of the PhD–I’ve had some busy deadlines for my thesis, as well as the teaching that comes with it. (Marking 80 essays in essentially 2 weeks is not recommended, nor is it conducive to a happy, relaxed mindset for reading.) I also am happy to report that I finished (the first draft) of a novel myself in that time (don’t try writing a novel while writing a PhD, peoples; […]
The sort of book I would have liked more had I read it 20 years ago
I’m giving this book 3 stars, and I feel guilty about it. I feel guilty because I know it’s a classic, because it’s 50 years old and still going strong, because the writing is really beautiful, and because I KNOW that if I had read this 15-20 years ago, I would have adored it. 8-13 year old me, who reread books about Narnia and Prydain and various retellings of King Arthur legends year after year (and read a crapload of mediocre Catholic historical fiction in the […]