My TV-show inspired reread of Outlander confirmed few things I thought I remembered about this book. Namely, that I liked it, but also found it almost silly at times. An enjoyable read, but not a great one. The good: inventive take on time-travel. Great female character in Claire. Historical milieus well realized and intriguing. Jamie. The cheerful abandon with which Gabaldon treats genre conventions. Is it science fiction? Is is romance? Is it supernatural romance? Historical fiction? Who knows? Who cares? It’s all that and […]
In 1866, the South Island of New Zealand was the hottest frontier for those who wanted to find their fortunes in the unexplored territories of the Southern Hemisphere. The California gold fields were mostly played out, so Europeans who had missed the opportunities of the fledgling West of America were booking passage to Dunedin, then on to Hokitika for a chance to strike it rich in the newly discovered gold fields. This exotic and diverse world becomes the setting for Eleanor Catton’s Booker Prize winning, expansive novel The […]
's CBR6 Review No:10 ·
Genres: Fiction, History, Mystery ·
Tags: Book Prize, Eleanor Catton, Fiction, Mrs Smith Reads, mystery, New Zealand, The Luminaries ·
March (Book 1): An Origin Story
What’s hard for kids to recognize – hell, what’s hard for people to recognize – is that we’re living through history right this minute. That, someday, there’s going to be a kid, bored of his mind, doodling in the margins of his brain tablet (or whatever space technology kids are learning on in the future), barely listening to his teacher drone on and on about ‘the geopolitical ramifications of US drone strikes in 2014’ or – in deference to today’s book – ‘Let’s compare and […]
A captivating true 19th century Chinatown murder mystery
Frog Music is stuffed full of characters, humor, drama, sex, and tragedy. It sprawls across the stage in technicolor, a stunning contrast to Donoghue’s earlier book Room, which confined her two protagonists—and her readers–to a tiny claustrophobic space for much of the story. And yet Frog Music has carved an aching and tender place in my heart, just as Room did. Frog Music takes place in 1876 San Francisco, and is based on the true story of the murder of street denizen Jenny Bonnet, a […]
This book completely ate my brain.
First of all, yes, this is essentially a five star review, but please note, it’s five stars with reservations. The five stars is almost entirely due to the first 1/3 or so of the book (and maybe a little past that) and how it absolutely took over my life. If I could, I’d probably rate the first 1/3 six or seven stars, and the rest four, but that’s obviously not possible, so here we are. The rest of the reason that I settled on five […]
An Echo in the Bone (Outlander #7) by Diana Gabaldon
First of all, don’t read this review if you haven’t read the previous six books. It won’t make any sense and it’ll spoil quite a bit. The Outlander series is fantastic, but it is not a series you can pick up in the middle. Go find the first six books (and you totally should), and come back when you’re done. I’ll wait. “True, the body’s easily maimed, and the spirit can be crippled – yet there’s that in a man that is never destroyed.” An Echo in […]
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