worth

Midnight Taxi Tango

Book Notes kitt decided around 10:18 on 25 November 2020 to publish this:

This is the second book of the "A Bone Street Rumba" series. I picked up all three books in the series at once, figuring even if I didn't thoroughly enjoy the series, at least I would have something to listen to on the drive back from Denver. The audio books were recommended to me, and I continue the recommendation: Older's reading is fantastic (which is unusual for most authors, tbh). This book had some incredibly jarring lyric reading by Older's child. I wasn't a fan of that part of the audiobook.

The book starts out with a little bit of Kia's story, filling in some heartache where she and her cousin investigate the weird things happening at a love interest of the cousin: a bunch of ghoulish men are creeping around the kid's house. Well, the ghoulish men decide to attack on the night Kia and her cousin are watching. Kia and Gio become involved in the mayhem, and survive. Gio later disappears, and Kia misses him desperately.

Thus starts a strange loop in Kia's life as small details of her life wraps back upon her: she's attacked by a ghost in a park, which is weird, her cousin returns, which is great, she gains the sight, which just is. and the bad guys escape. Which is to say, the weird ghost in the front yard is part of the climax, Gio is not Gregorio, Caitlin is a bad guy, and the idea of pink roaches is just gross.

I enjoyed the book as much as the first one, and agree they are worth reading for the entertainment.

I find new life in each moment like this: the midnight brownstones breezing past me, the siren song of something foul dragging me forward. This is life, and really, anything is better than the sheer emptiness of so many lost memories.
Page 39

Midnight Sun

Book Notes Written with a loving hand by kitt some time around 20:09 on 24 November 2020

This book was slightly confusing at first, as it is the second book of the Blood on Snow series, but the protagonist of the first book died, but did he? The first book had two divergent endings, one of which was clearly delusional, but this second book initially has the reader (well, this reader) pondering the truth of that conclusion.

Eventually, I figured out, this book is the same world, but a different character set in that world, name change be damned, and then I was back into the tale.

We have Ulf, who is fleeing the Fisherman, after, quelle surprise, screwing the Fisherman in some small way. That the contract killer didn't and couldn't actually kill played a large part of that screwing and fleeing. The plot is your basic boy flees crime boss, boy visits small town, boy meets up with down-on-luck girl with issues and a kid, boy and girl like each other, crime boss' henchman shows up in small town, henchman is thwarted by small town's population, boy and girl live happily ever after plot, the same one that a dozen action movie plots use.

I enjoyed the book. It was a fast, mildly engaging read. it'll make more sense with the previous book read first. Worth reading if you're a Nesbø fan.

I sold hash and saved up for that bastard miracle cure I forced myself to believe in because the alternative was unbearable, because my fear that the little girl with the blue light in her eyes would die was even stronger than my own fear of death. Because we take comfort where we can find it: in a German medical journal, in a syringe full of heroin, in a shiny new book promising eternal life as long as you subordinate yourself to whatever new saviour they’ve just come up with.
Location: 1,173

“Thanks for taking care of Knut after the funeral.”

Half-Resurrection Blues

Book Notes Yeah, kitt finished writing this at 21:14 on 21 November 2020

This is the first book of the "A Bone Street Rumba" series. I picked up the book after a second recommendation for it, one from Claire and one from the XOXO slack. One of the strong recommendations from both was, "listen to this book." The book is read by the author, whose voice caresses the listener as it takes the listener on a wild ride.

So, I listened to this book more than I read it. The audio version recommendation? Totally worth it.

In this book, we are introduced to Carlos Delacruz, an in-betweener who is half-alive, half-dead. He worked as an agent for the New York Council of the Dead, a vague power group who directs its people to reap souls to keep the dead in the underworld, and the living out of the underworld. We learn about Carlos as he vaguely recalls things. He doesn't recall his life before his resurrection. He follows the rules of the Council. He leads the dead back to the underworld, or reaps their soul for the second death or some such.

At the beginning of the tale, Carlos meets up with another inbetweener, wait what, there are others? and kills him, per the order of the Council. Turns out, on his dying breath, the guy Carlos kills asks Carlos to watch over his sister, Sasha. Another wait what? She is also an inbetweener. And apparently very very hot. Of course they hook up. But what is this pull and what are all these ngks? Well, the ngks are tiny, exercise bike riding spirits with a hive mind contracted to kill an old spirit in order to open the entrance between the Underworld and the real world. They're kinda mean, too.

So, Carlos uncovers his past, Sasha's past, what the ngks are, who is orchestrating the opening of the Underworld, and just how meh the Council is. The book is a fun read, worth reading / listening to.

Network Effect

Book Notes Yeah, kitt finished writing this at 21:34 on 11 October 2020

Finished this one in two days and, unsurprisingly, adored it as much as I enjoyed the previous four books. I picked it up when my frustration with The Making of a Manager grew too large, and Ginsberg's My Own Words would not sooth the agitation of the previous book. Sometimes you need an adventure to cleanse your palette of the crap that is incompetence and surveillance, and even RBG can't do it. Enter Wells and Murderbot.

Following Exit Strategy, Murderbot is in the employ of The Preservation, and is off on a full-length adventure that lasts more than one short mystery (read: novella) solution. He (It?) is tasked with taking care of Mensah's daughter on her first expedition, which goes sideways (because Murderbot).

This book is just so delightful. We have mystery. We have emotions (shock, even from Murderbot)! We have a plot that just doesn't stop, absurd situations that are, as ART says, "unreal," and laugh-out-loud deadpan humor that I love.

Basic plot: Murderbot is on an expedition with Amena, who didn't originally like Murderbot because said SecUnit interfered with a tryst that was going to go bad, but Amena being young didn't realize was a con by a Corporate spy. Of course, bonds forged by trial, aliens, spaceship attack, and all, and Amena and Murderbot like each other. Along the way, that asshole research transport returns, we go off to find its crew, a few more Preservation crew show up, along with a few grey men, and hilarity ensues. No, really, the hilarity in the writing of the Murderbot dialog and thoughts is fantastic. None of the quotes I pull out are amusing when isolated, and hysterical in context.

I enjoyed these books so much. I'm glad there's another book following.

Lovecraft Country

Book Notes kitt decided around 12:15 on 7 August 2020 to publish this:

While sitting at the dining table at Chez Oliphant, Claire and I started talking books. I suspect we started talking about books because I was lamenting not having any good road trip books, and I was about to start a four day road trip. Well, for solo road trip books, Claire has some great recommendations. This one came out because I had recommended the Dread Nation sequel (zombies!), and Claire countered with Lovecraft, or rather Jim Crow South with Cthulhu. Go on...

Turns out, while there are elements of Lovecraft in the book, the book is more an homage to Lovecraft than a Lovecraftian fan-fic. It reads like a serial, with eight separate stories, each tangentially related to the others, told in sequential order, each with different characters as the focus. There is an over-arching plot, which works very well with the satisfying ending (good guys win! rah!). The Jim Crow parts were uncomfortable reading and that is likely the point. One of the stories didn't interest me at all, but the uncomfortable parts relating to abuse of power were worth sticking with.

I think Claire's review sums up the book well: "White people were all, 'Gasp! Ghosts???' and the black people were all, shrug 'Ghosts. Sure, okay.'" The Wikipedia article sums up the individual stories well. If you like urban fiction with a hint of Lovecraft, and want to sit with racial difficulties (yes, you do), this is a great book to pick up. So great that it is a mini-series. I suspect the book is better, but haven't seen the show, so don't know.

Weird

Book Notes Yeah, kitt finished writing this at 08:58 on 16 July 2020

Okay, when your tribe recommends a book, and an Internet Personality™ who has not failed in his book recommendations for you recommends the same book, well, you kinda have to read said recommendation. This book is that recommendation. This book is worth that recommendation.

Here's the thing, when you are the odd one out, when you are the weird one, your life is more difficult than the lives of those who fit in, who make friends easily, who aren't teased for being who they are, who don't stand out. Khazan understands, having been the weird one. She goes through how it feels to be weird, retells her journey, reviews many others' journeys with being weird, tells us there is strength in our weirdness, and lets us know it gets better. It does.

There's a cadence to this book that is welcoming, like sitting with a friend you've known for decades at a quiet cafe in a small European city and talking for hours. It's a nice feeling. During that conversation, Khazan tells us about the inverse correlations between societies' conformity and freedoms, about how different opinions lead to better decisions, about how being outside is a strength, and about how you have the choice to confirm or stay weird.

I enjoyed this book, and likely would have devoured this when I was 11 years old and crying that I just wanted to be normal, why wasn't I normal? I've found peace in my gracelessness, in my dorkitude, in my being the only girl in a group of "hey guys!" but it took a long, long time to find that peace. I would argue this book many years ago might have helped me accept myself faster. For that, I recommend this book to anyone who is even just a little bit weird. I'd tell them, "It's okay. Here, read this one, and Grit and let's talk."

The Last Emperox

Book Notes Yeah, kitt finished writing this at 22:55 on 9 July 2020

This is book three of Scalzi's Interdepency and much like the first one in the series, I picked up the book and pretty much read it straight through, with a couple pauses to, oh, you know, work and sleep. In reality, after reading Redshirts, I wanted to keep reading Scalzi, despite having several books going already. That's the way it is sometimes.

So, a few things about this book.

1. Scalzi is taking notes from George R. R. Martin, and I don't like it. I had to read that Martin-esque part over again three, maybe four times, skip to the end, come back, read it again, and, did I mention I don't like it because I'm sure I did. Sure, yes, good plot point, nice foreshadowing, interesting twist, and I don't like it.

2. There is likely a reason the name Kiva and the name Kitt are so fucking similar that you can't fucking help but fucking notice the fucking similarity. You can guess which character's storyline I enjoyed reading the fucking most. And no, my mother does not fucking talk that way, thankfully.

3. I absolutely love how many times in this book in particular, a character would stop and, while being upset at something another character said, recognize that the shit thing that came from the other character (words, gestures, advice, the like) was actually fair. Authors often have verbal tics, words or phrases repeated so frequently in a book that they stand out. I don't recall any of Scalzi's other tics offhand, but this one stood out. I liked it. I rather wish more people were able to separate the message from the messenger and appreciate the feedback being given.

Redshirts

Book Notes Instead of being asleep at 19:55 on 6 July 2020, kitt created this:

Okay, yes, I know that I have said, on numerous occasions, if Scalzi writes it, I will read it. That is just the way it is, no arguing.

Except I hadn't read this book. I had actively chosen not to read this book. Why? Because the reviews said it diverged from the classic science fiction that Scalzi is known for, and if I wanted to read not-science-fiction Scalzi, I'll read his blog. So, I skipped it.

All the way until Rob commented that it was the perfect brain candy and he hadn't laughed this hard in a while (who knows if that while is more than I day, I don't, because getting Rob to laugh is a goal of every conversation), and I have already read it wait I haven't well I should. So, as soon as I was done with The Gates of Fire (which I recommended to Rob), I started Redshirts.

Is not classic Scalzi science fiction.

Is amusing.

Yes, the Redshirt phenomenon from Star Trek is the title of the book, and yes, the characters figure this out, but there are more absurdities in the plot, resulting in an internally-consistent and thoroughly-absurd plot twist (time travel back to the authors) that is the cause for the original fanboy uproar that kept me from reading the book. It wasn't so bad. I enjoyed how all the pieced tied up nicely at the end.

Worth reading if you're a Scalzi fan, or a quirky science-fiction fan.

Dahl paused a moment before answering. “Do you know how the rich are different than you or me?” he asked Duvall.

“You mean, besides having more money,” Duvall said.

“Yeah,” Dahl said.

“No,” Duvall said.

The Road

Book Notes Written with a loving hand by kitt some time around 22:47 on 17 June 2020

This book was recommended by Ryan Holiday in his June reading list. It sounded interesting, so I borrowed it from the library, read it, and here we are.

The struggle in this book is man against nature in a post-apocalyptic world which seems to be some sort of ecological disaster that blighted the world. Many scenes include ash and melted roads, along with the two main characters, a father and his son, covering their faces with masks so that they can breathe. The disaster is such that it appears there are very few people left, and the ability to grow crops or feed is pretty much gone. The remaining people are struggling to survive, which includes resorting to anything edible, including other people.

The journey of the father and son is to the ocean. They are moving along with a shopping cart, trying to survive. They appear to have been doing this together for six, eight, maybe ten years, since the boy was born, and the ocean is some level of salvation. Except it really isn't. It is more like "something to do that provides some level of meaning."

I can see where the book would be more emotional if, say, a parent is reading the book and is thinking of their child when reading it. I lack that perspective, so some aspects were perhaps lost on me. What wasn't lost on me was the portrayal of flowing empathy and refused kindness. The boy wants to help, the father knows they can't. The boy is angry the father refused to help some people, the father fears losing his son's love as the father chooses their survival. It's a hard choice, too willfully lose your humanity to keep a loved one alive.

The book is worth reading, but I'm not sure it would be one of my first books to recommend.

Across Five Aprils

Book Notes Yeah, kitt finished writing this at 19:11 on 10 June 2020

Because I wasn't done reading books I should have read, but didn't, in junior high and high school, nor was I done reading historical war fiction, I picked up this book. Well, that, and because it was recommended as a book that illustrates different aspects of the Civil War (Abe's a babe!). The Killer Angels was also recommended, so both entered into my reading list in the fast track.

The five Aprils of the title are the five Aprils that the Civil War spans. The story opens with an introduction to Jethro Creighton, a white Southern Illinois 9 year old boy who farms a plot of land with his father, brother, three brothers (might have been a cousin in there), and sister. There had been several other siblings in the mix, but death came to at least four that I was paying attention to (illness for three, wagon accident for one). His mother, Ellen, couldn't read, but Jenny, his sister, could. The whole family works the farm in some fashion.

While reading the book, I was struck with how much the book smacks of Early American Stoicism: work needs doing, so do it; life sucks, you carry on; tragedies happen, appreciate the bounties. The book was published in 1964, which makes me wonder if this is more "This is how we think people thought back then," more than "people actually thought this way back then." I had the same question when reading The Little House on the Prairie. Was that really the prevailing mentality? Or are we fictionalizing it the same way Gone with the Wind fictionalized "It was about state's rights!"?

Pages