Red Seas Under Red Skies by Scott Lynch (Review)

Title: Red Seas Under Red Skies
Author: Scott Lynch
First published: 2007
Add it: Goodreads, The Book Depository
Rating: ★★★★★

"Locke Lamora stood on the pier in Tal Verrar with the hot wind of a burning ship at his back and the cold bite of a loaded crossbow's bolt at his neck."

How can you not love a book which starts like this??? It's like the most awesome starting line I've encountered lately, as it gets you right into the mood! From the first line you see there will be ships (and quite some of them burning!), grave danger and our beloved Lamora in the middle of all this. If you have no idea who the hell he is, note that this is the second book in the series, so you should better read my review of the first book, or better still grab the books themselves :)

After a narrow escape from Camorr, Locke and Jean have established themselves in Tal Verrar, also a state-city, but with a different character. Of course, there is a huge heist underway, in the biggest and the most prestigious gambling club of the city. But as you may guess they are not able to pull it through smoothly, as greater forces are about to interfere. Remember the wizard they mutilated in the first book? Well, his colleagues are not leaving him unrequited. Besides, the archon, a military leader of the city, has his own needs, which he is very good at making other's needs too. Caught in the middle of political affairs of the city, Gentlemen Bastards need to go to sea and mingle with pirates, struggling for their lives and trying to win in a losing game.

Unlike the first book, I wasn't caught up immediately. The first 150 or so pages were a bit too descriptive and "preparatory" for my taste, which may be my own fault, because it's the end of the semester, and it's difficult for me to get involved in something else. But then they went to sea, and I was again in a wonderful state of not being able to put the novel down! The seafaring setting won me over completely, because I love sails, ships, pirates, ship life, all the sea terms, etc. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I learned it all in the times I was sailing myself on a replica of an 18-century ship? A lot of things were very recognizable and dear to me :) Look at this quote, for example:

"My head is full of little ships, all going round and round gleefully making up new names for the things on their decks!"

- everybody who had to learn sea vocabulary at some point in their lives know the feeling! :) Lynch even added some cute sailing traditions, which, unlike our Earth ones, require a woman on board for good luck! Besides, they are really good officers and some of them are also awesome gals! Yes, as you can guess, there's a whole set of new characters in the book, and they are really cool! :)

Although I enjoyed the book greatly, I do have some minor complaints about the plot, which was not as smooth as the first book's. For example, I totally saw some plot twists coming! That clearly was not the author's intention... And I still don't understand one thing: how had they thoughtfully got one guy's seal in advance, if they supposedly had an idea about how to use it only much later?? Or have I missed something? Oh, well, it's useless to complain anyway. I guess it's a bane of any series - no sequel can be as good as the first book. Although if the first book is THAT awesome, the sequels are still pretty great :)

On the bright side, there's some moving character growth in the book, which is to be expected after some of the hardships Locke and Jean have been through. And there was a place where I really cried. Embarrassingly, my mom called me at exactly that moment, and the look of my face frightened her a bit before I explained that I'm OK, it's just a book :)

In my book:
If you've read the first book, you probably already know you need to read all the sequels too :) And if you haven't - it's time to start, dudes! :)

History Reading Challenge 2014

First I was reluctant to join Fanda's new challenge, because me? reading history? with all the dates and names? Difficult to imagine :) Really, I like reading historical fiction, but I never remember historical facts. I don't know why, I have a very good memory, capable of holding several languages, but all the historical facts just escape it somehow. Sometimes my ignorance is even embarrassing, but I've kind of learned to live with it. So I wasn't going to participate, but then I signed up for The Arthurian Literature Reading Challenge and realized that my first two books for the challenge were actually histories! So I've decided I'll sign up for Student level, which requires reading 1-3 books. Who knows, maybe I'll like it and read something more? :)

So the two books I'm planning to read for the challenge are:

• Historia Brittonum attributed to Nennius (9th century)
• Historia Regum Britanniae by Geoffrey of Monmouth (c. 1136)

Wish me good luck!

Chess Story by Stefan Zweig (Review)

Title: Chess Story
Author: Stefan Zweig
First published: 1941
Add it: Goodreads, The Book Depository
Rating: ★★★★★

Writing this review is gonna be difficult, so where do I start? Let's try to begin with the obvious, superficial plot. The author is on a ship, and he learns that the world chess champion Czentovic is travelling too. The champion has a very bad temper, but the author and his wealthy acquaintance manage to coax him into a play against all the enthusiasts on board. Needless to say, he wins game after game, unless a mysterious adviser appears in the group of desperate amateurs, who helps them to find a way from a tough situation and draw the game. Everybody is intrigued and ask him to play against Czentovic again. Reluctantly, he agrees, but he seems to be nervous about it, and soon the author hears his full story and learns how he has mastered chess so well.

That's pretty all that can be said about the plot of this short novella, but then it goes deeper into the remembrances of that mysterious player, and there are all the reflections about Nazi occupation, mental anguish, psychological conflicts and many more. This really cannot be described in a short review, so my only advise for you is to read it. These two hours of your reading life will not be spent in vain.

Interesting trivia: it's the last work of Zweig, he wrote it just before committing suicide in his residence in Brasil. So it's pretty desperate and reflects his view of the state of humankind in Europe.

In my book:
Dark and disturbing, but irresistibly fascinating.

The Arthurian Literature Reading Challenge 2014

This awesome challenge is hosted by Jean at Howling Frog Books, and if you want to know more and sign up (and believe me, you do!), please go HERE.

I'm super-excited about it, and I hope to do the Paladin level, which requires reading more than 6 works, two of which may be Recent (1950+) and two must be Old (pre-1800). What books am I planning to read in particular? Below I've listed what seems to me to be the most important works in Arthurian canon. There are much more, but those in the list are famous and/or classical. (I couldn't use English Wikipedia page, because it's too overwhelming, so I used the Russian one instead.)

Some of the books from the list I have read before, but I've still put them here for consistency's sake. I'm planning to go through the ones I haven't read in chronological order until I'm run out of enthusiasm or unless I have to skip something because of its insufferable nature (The Faerie Queene, I'm looking at you). We'll see how many I'll get through by the end of next year :) I'll track my progress here and link my reviews to this list.

1. Historia Brittonum attributed to Nennius (9th century)
2. The works of Geoffrey of Monmouth:
· The History of the Kings of Britain (1136)
· Life of Merlin (1150)
3. Mabinogion by Anonymous (14th century)
4. The poems of Chrétien de Troyes:
· Erec and Enide (circa 1170s)
· Cligés (circa 1170s)
· Yvain, the Knight of the Lion (circa 1180s)
· Lancelot, the Knight of the Cart (circa 1180s)
· Perceval, the Story of the Grail (circa 1190)
5. The poems of Hartmann von Aue:
· Iwein (late 12th century)
· Erec (late 12th century)
6. Parzival by Wolfram von Eschenbach (c. 1210s)
7. Lancelot-Grail by Anonymous (c. 1210s-1230s)
· Estoire del Saint Grail
· Estoire de Merlin
· Lancelot propre
· Queste del Saint Graal
· Mort Artu
8. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight by The Pearl Poet (14th century)
9. Le Morte d'Arthur by Sir Thomas Malory (1485)
10. The Faerie Queene by Edmund Spenser 1590
11. Idylls of the King by Alfred  by Lord Tennyson (1856–1885)
12. King Arthur by Edward Bulwer-Lytton (1848–9)
13. The Defence of Guenevere by William Morris (1892)
14. A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain (1889)
15. The Once and Future King by T. H. White
· The Sword in the Stone (1938)
· The Queen of Air and Darkness (or The Witch in the Wood) (1939)
· The Ill-Made Knight (1940)
· The Candle in the Wind (1958)
· The Book of Merlyn (1958)
16. The Merlin series by Mary Stewart
· The Crystal Cave (1970)
· The Hollow Hills (1973)
· The Last Enchantment (1979)
· The Wicked Day (1983)
· The Prince and the Pilgrim (1995)
17. The Acts of King Arthur and His Noble Knights by John Steinbeck (1975)
18. The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley (1983)
19. The Coming of the King: The First Book of Merlin by Nikolai Tolstoy (1988)
20. The Warlord Chronicles by Bernard Cornwell
· The Winter King (1995)
· Enemy of God (1996)
· Excalibur (1997)

What do you think of the list? Haven't I left out something important or awesome? I can't wait to kick the challenge off! :)

Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card (Review)

Title: Ender's Game
Author: Orson Scott Card
First published: 1977
Add it: Goodreads, The Book Depository
Rating: ★★★☆☆

I was expecting to love this book, as everybody who have read it are just crazy about it, beginning with my BF. Well, this didn't happen. Why? Well, let's begin with the plot.

The book tells about a future in which children are trained to command in space wars, because their minds are still flexible and sharp. So they are all monitored, and the most suitable are chosen and sent to a battle school for further training. Ender is one of them, although not quite, because he is the chosen one best of the best, and he is pushed to his limits in training, as the invasion is supposedly approaching and he is to be the commander in chief of the whole fleet.

Reading this was a very disturbing experience for me, because it's all about children wars. Now, I think children can be awfully creepy and violent, and giving them real weapons is the worst idea ever. Letting them solve their problems by themselves inevitably ends up in a Lord of the Flies kind of situations, and I really, really don't like it. I also found it hard to believe that children at 6 can have some genius tactical plans, and pass as adults on the Internet at 12. And they are all deadly serious, always! Creeps.

Well, maybe it's just me, and nobody else has these problems, I don't know. I see how this book has a lot of great stuff that people like. Take scientific predictions, for example: there are tablets, drone warfare and Internet politics, all very believable. Wonderful, considering it was written in 1977! There is also null gravity, aliens, spaceships, and much more. It just didn't hold together for me very well because of the creepy children.

I read the book as a preparation for the new movie, and now when I can compare them, I think that movie is actually better (gasp!). They left out some of the pathetic gibberish, and made some really nice special effects. I know, I know, I'm not very demanding, I just like a beautiful and entertaining picture on the screen! :)

There was some hype lately about Card's homophobic views, so let me assure you there's nothing of this in the book! One of its main ideas is actually the necessity to reach out and understand those who are different from us, quite the opposite!

In my book:
It's a good, solid Sci-Fi, just didn't work for me.

My Own Definitive Science Fiction List With Blackjack And Hookers

In preparation for Carl's Sci-Fi Experience and The Vintage Sci-Fi Month, I'm joining Rinn's Sci-Fi Challenge, because I rather like her definitive list. I've learned about this challenge from Riv, who has posted her own list here, with some awesome additions.

So for my own version I'm keeping the books from both Rinn's and Riv's lists, with the addition of some of my own favourites. I've made this list even more representative of Soviet/Russian Sci-Fi, because heck, I know a thing or two about it! I was trying to behave and not to put all Lukyanenko, Strugatsky brothers and Belayev there, although it was really hard to choose just one or two of their books. I hope you find something new here, and as for me, I'm on my way to fill the gaps and read the books that are not crossed out yet :)

'Classic' science fiction
1. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
2. I, Robot by Isaac Asimov
3. Foundation by Isaac Asimov
4. The Drowned World by J.G. Ballard
5. Amphibian Man by Alexander Belayev
6. Heart of a Dog by Mikhail Bulgakov
7. Abduction of a Sorcerer by Kir Bulychov
8. The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury
9. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
10. Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clarke
11. 2001: A Space Odyssey by Arthur C. Clarke
12. R.U.R. by Karel Čapek
13. The Lost World by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
14. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick
15. The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick
16. Dune by Frank Herbert
17. Starship Troopers by Robert A. Heinlein
18. Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein
19. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
20. Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
21. Solaris by Stanislaw Lem
22. I Am Legend by Richard Matheson
23. A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller Jr.
24. Ringworld by Larry Niven
25. The Mote in God's Eye by Larry Niven
26. Sannikov Land by Vladimir Obruchev
27. 1984 by George Orwell
28. Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
29. A Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs
30. Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
31. Star Maker by Olaf Stapledon
32. Hard to Be a God by Arkady & Boris Strugatsky
33. Roadside Picnic by Arkady & Boris Strugatsky
34. The Garin Death Ray by Alexei Nikolayevich Tolstoy
35. Journey to the Centre of the Earth by Jules Verne
36. Twenty-thousand Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne
37. Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut
38. The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells
39. The Time Machine by H.G. Wells
40. The Day of the Triffids by John Wyndham
41. The Midwich Cuckoos by John Wyndham
42. We by Yevgeni Zamyatin

Newer science fiction
43. Oryx and Crake by Margaret Attwood
44. The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
45. The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi
46. Consider Phlebas by Iain M. Banks
47. The Stars My Destination by Alfred Bester
48. Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card
49. Ready Player One by Ernest Cline
50. Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton
51. Guardians of Paradise by Jaine Fenn
52. Neuromancer by William Gibson
53. The Forever War by Joe Haldeman
54. Labyrinth of Reflections by Sergei Lukyanenko
55. The Road by Cormac McCarthy
56. Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell
57. Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan
58. The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin
59. The Quantum Thief by Hannu Rajaniemi
60. House of Suns by Alastair Reynolds
61. Revelation Space by Alastair Reynolds
62. Red Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson
63. The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell
64. Old Man's War by John Scalzi
65. Hyperion by Dan Simmons
66. Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson
67. Mockingbird by Walter Tevis

Young Adult science fiction
68. Ultraviolet by R.J. Anderson
69. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
70. Breathe by Sarah Crossan
71. The Maze Runner by James Dashner
72. Little Brother by Cory Doctorow
73. Earth Girl by Janet Edwards
74. Legend by Marie Lu
75. Cinder by Melissa Meyer
76. The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness
77. Across the Universe by Beth Revis
78. Divergent by Veronica Roth
79. All Our Yesterdays by Cristin Terrill
80. What's Left Of Me by Kat Zhang

Sooo, what do you think about this list? Sounds great, right? :)

R2D2 is approving:

source

The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch (Enthusiastic Review)

Title: The Lies of Locke Lamora
Author: Scott Lynch
First published: 2006
Add it: Goodreads, The Book Depository
Rating: ★★★★★

I've finished reading The Lies of Locke Lamora late this night. So late it was actually nearly morning. I just couldn't put it down, because it's one amazing bastard of a book: it doesn't let you do anything else at all! You are lucky if you at least remember to eat, sleep and visit the bathroom while reading it. Forget about being reasonable, making stuff done or looking nice, it's totally useless, I tell you. :)

First, I need to thank Sarah at Sarah Says Read, whose wonderful review prompted me to actually read this novel, which I had already been eyeing for some time then. I don't usually expect to see something REALLY new in fantasy books these times. It's probably a pessimistic approach, but the more I read, the more repetitive stuff I see. But The Lies of Locke Lamora was a fresh whiff, because it not only builds a beautiful and unique world, populated with awesome characters, it also sets up all kinds of CONS in it, some well-planned and elaborate, and some - brilliantly improvised.

Now, let me confess that I LOVE cons. Some of my favorite movies and series are about con men: Leverage, Hustle, Now You See Me, Ocean's Eleven/Twelve/etc. to name some. So the charming gang of Locke immediately won my sympathies. They style themselves Gentlemen Bastards, and the things they can pull off with the rich and unaware are incredible! Of course, there are minds in their city that can match theirs, and some of them are not happy with having Lamora's gang around...

Apart from an amusing and at times really surprising plot, The Lies of Locke Lamora has a wonderful setting: it's a city styled after medieval Venice, with channels, islands, dirt, smells, plagues, gangs and weird celebrations. It's dark and wet and menacing, and there are mysterious Elderglass towers overlooking it, a legacy of some long vanished civilization and the residence of the Duke and his nobility.

To finish the praise I'll just add that the humor in the book is unfailing. I'm very picky as regards humor, and it's difficult to please me in this aspect, but plot twists and witty dialogues in this novel made me smile all the time. But please don't think that it's just a fun book! It is fun, but it does have some really dark parts too, because you can't expect everything to always go well if you are a thief in such a place. And these parts are equally well-written and are sometimes heartbreaking.

In my book:
Read it now! Seriously, don't wait! You are missing something really cool!

SOS - Help Needed!

I need your help, my dear friends, so solve a very difficult problem that I'm facing with the approaching December. Winter is coming, and there are 4 read-a-longs of some daunting books that I really want to read, plus a Sci-Fi event that I will be participating in, and I totally don't know which to choose! The problem is, as usual, the lack of time: December for me is not only the end of the semester, it's also a long-expected visit home for the time when Catholics have Christmas and a high time to start preparing for the January exams. So I HAVE to choose ONE of these difficult chunky classics, because I will not be able to read more. So how about I list my options here and you tell me what you think I should choose? I'd so appreciate it!

Option 1: Middlemarch readalong at Too Fond, running from December 1st to 31st

Pros:
- is on my Classics Club list
- it was my Classics Spin title, so it's kind of... destiny?
- I've already started it in March and read the first part
- there's a clear weekly plan for the readalong. I love schedules!
- it's supposed to be very satirical, multi-layered and enjoyable... hm..

Cons:
- there's a reason I abandoned it after the first part, and I'm not sure I will not be suffering the same this time
- it's 900 f***ing pages!

Option 2: A Tale of Two Cities readalong at An Armchair By The Sea, running from December 1st to 22nd

Pros:
- I've meant to read it for a long time
- December kind of suits for reading Dickens
- I like the button
- it's only 400 pages

Cons:
- it's not on my Classics club list, but I guess I can add another book there. *sighs* It keeps growing...

Option 3: Little Women readalong at Unscripted, running from December 1st to 29th

Pros:
- it's on my Classics Club list
- it's supposed to be a sweet and easy book, suitable even for children, although full 500 pages long

Cons:
- I just have this strange feeling I will not like it very much.. But I suppose it's not a valid reason :)

Option 4: Ulysses readalong at Roof Beam Reader, running from December 15th to January 5th

Pros:
- I'm so afraid of this book I'll never start to read it on my own. Srsly, I'm panicking even when I just think about it. I need an event for this!
- it's the best book for boasting that you have actually read it
- it's also on my Classics Club list

Cons:
- the timing couldn't be worse: out of 21 days for the readalong, 16 I will be enjoying my visit home, refreshing my distance relationships, buying gifts and then traveling. Not even the relatively calm beginning of December to get me started...

Sooo.. guys, what should I do? I'd really appreciate your opinions on the above-mentioned books to help me decide which one to choose! :)

Inkheart by Cornelia Funke (Review)

Title: Inkheart
Author: Cornelia Funke
First published: 2003
Add it: Goodreads, The Book Depository
Rating: ★★★★★

This year's German Literature Month is focusing on female writers, and when I started to think what books to choose, Funke was the only German female writer that came to my mind. The only one! I shamed myself and consulted the Internet, but even after that Inkheart remained the most alluring choice. Well, what can I say, I'm in a really escapist mood right now :) I'm craving something magic and beautiful, and this novel is THE BEST for this!

There is every component of a great children's book in Inkheart: a bunch of scary bad guys, a brave little girl as a protagonist, a really cool dad with a mysterious past, beautiful mountainous settings, chases, fights, magic, and a cute little marten with horns! What makes Inkheart special though, is that it's all about books, about different worlds inside them that are so real they can come to life, about the comfort reading brings in difficult situations and about all the cool books out there that wait to be read. References to some of my own childhood favourites, such as Treasure Island or Pippi Longstocking made me smile more than once.

In my book:
That's a perfect children's book, and it'll make you feel like a child in a wonderland :)

If on a Winter's Night a Traveller by Italo Calvino (Review)

Title: If on a Winter's Night a Traveller
Author: Italo Calvino
First published: 1979
Add it: Goodreads, The Book Depository
Rating: ★★★★★

It's a meta-book. It's a book about books. It's a book about you reading books. And yes, it's every inch as crazy as this description makes it sound! My feelings while reading the novel were something like "Ha-ha, Calvino, what are you doing to me? Stoooop, you bastard!". No wonder I couldn't slow down enough to read along with the guys from this wonderful event. I HAD to know what else he had in store for me!

The book focuses on a Reader - you, who has just bought a new Calvino book If on a Winter's Night a Traveller and is starting to read it. The first chapter totally grips you, but then... you discover that there is some printing mess, and the rest of the pages are from some other book. You go to the bookshop to scandal, but they could do nothing, and so you start a hunt for the book, exploring more and more book beginnings which have nothing to do with the book you have started to read... Sometime on the way you meet a beautiful female Reader, who joins you in your quest. Where it'll bring you? Ha, if only you knew...

Incorporated in this one novel there are a total of 10 book beginnings of different genres, with different settings, characters and plots. And they are ALL worth to be stand-alone novels if only they had the chance. It's amazing how Calvino plays with different styles and how unbelievably good he is at any and all of them. Somewhere in the middle of the book I felt frustration that I'm not to know how all these stories end, but then I started to think that it's really not necessary. I mean, if you recognize the genre of the book, you can very well predict what kinds of events will happen there. So do you actually need to read the book just to make sure? Isn't it better to guess?

In the intermissions between the book beginnings there are some really interesting thoughts and musings on reading-related topics. Calvino describes in detail the processes of preparing to open a new book, of visiting a bookshop, of participating in a book club... He lets the reader meet different types of bookish people: a researcher, a publisher, a writer, a non-reader and many more. It's not very fair, I think, as everybody reading this novel is a reader, so literally everybody reading it is bound to find something to relate to. So it's good to keep in mind that Calvino is playing with you and not to take it seriously :)

In my book:
It's a great novel, very readable, very amusing, and yet very thoughtful and sometimes frustrating. Not recommended to people who need a closure to everything - it can really piss them off :) Otherwise - it's a book for you and about you, reader, so go read it!