Review: The Rest of us Just Live Here by Patrick Ness

 

Rating: 1/5 stars

CW for the book/review: mention of eating disorders, alcoholism, OCD/anxiety, emotional abuse

Here’s a milestone on this blog: my first bona fide rant.

The only reason this isn't one star is because, despite the overall mediocrity of the book, I still loved the premise - a bunch of normal kids just trying to get their goddamn high school diploma while in the background the Chosen Ones fall in love with vampires and summon mythological beings and blow up the school (multiple times). (NB: because of the thing mentioned in the rant at the bottom, I've revised my rating to 1 star, lmao.)

At the beginning, I thought that I just didn't like this because it was set in a high school; let's be real here, a high school is the most boring place on Earth and the only reason to use it as a setting is so that high schoolers can relate to it. Which is obviously completely fine, but if you're like me and haven't been in high school for a few years, it's pretty boring.

But it wasn't just because it was in high school that it was boring. The whole thing was just... fucking boring?

Also, the whole vibe of this was that these were the "ordinary kids" except they... weren't, really? Mikey and Mel's mother is a state senator running for Congress or the Actual Senate (idk I'm not sure, I'm not American so I'm not entirely sure how this shit works), and Henna's parents are going on this charity/missionary thing to Africa during the summer and taking her with them. Obviously it would be boring if they were completely ordinary, but I feel like a lot of the point of this book was portraying the characters as an "everyman" sort of character who everyone could relate to, and they... weren't, really.

But one thing that WAS relatable was a great portrayal of mental illness, specifically bulimia and OCD, and a turbulent home life, including an alcoholic father and an emotionally absent mother (I don't want to call her emotionally abusive because I'm not entirely sure that's the right term for it, but she's definitely Not Great).

I liked the metaphor of the adults not believing all the supernatural shit going on even though they saw the same shit when they were teens, as a parallel to adults dismissing/trivialising teenager's problems because they've forgotten how turbulent adolescence can be and that it is in fact very easy to have The Worst Day of Your Life when you're young and haven't really had many days in the first place.

But I would hesitate recommending this to anyone, including teenagers. As I said, I thought at the beginning it was boring just because of high school and that I'd have loved it when I was sixteen, but after reading the rest, I don't think I would.

There was also a mention that Mikey, the MC, slept with a 27 year old woman when he was 16, and it's all kind of brushed under the rug? Literally the only thing that's said about it is that his mother was "a bit upset" and Mikey describes himself as being "a bit stupid sometimes" - like, ex-fucking-scuse me? What the hell kind of message is that sending to teenagers? It's pretty irresponsible to put this in a book marketed towards teens and to not say something like "this woman was a predator and the teenage boy wasn't at fault" or something. (I know the age of consent in some countries, including my own, is 16 but I honestly think it should be 18, with a "Romeo and Juliet" law where two minors within 2 years of each other wouldn't get prosecuted, because adults having sex with minors turns my fucking stomach. But I could rant about this all day and I'm veering off course a little, so.)

TL;DR incredibly disappointing, wasted potential, wouldn't recommend to anybody, massive failure, the end.

Review: Fellside by M.R. Carey [Horror, Mystery/Suspense]

 

Rating: 5/5 stars

M.R. Carey solidified himself in my mind as a masterful writer of horror and suspense with The Girl With All the Gifts and its sequel, so I was both nervous and excited for this - excited for the obvious reasons, and nervous because if this disappointed me, it was falling from a great height - and since this has quite mediocre ratings on Goodreads (3.5 at the time of writing), this worried me even further. 

Thankfully, this was one of the semi-regular times when Goodreads and I have differed in opinion. 

I hadn't read The Girl in a long time, so although I had a vague memory that I liked Carey's writing style a lot, I had forgotten just how good it was. This is basically the blueprint of how to write a horror/suspense novel - perfectly paced; exquisitely structured with layers of plot and mysteries that tangle and unfurl; unpretentious writing that nevertheless had some absolutely fantastic turns of phrase and descriptive flourishes without overwhelming the narrative, like just a pinch of saffron in a dish. 

There's also an absolutely stellar cast of characters. Set in a prison that's rotten and corrupt to the core, Carey introduces the most unsympathetic characters and somehow manages to twist them into being sympathetic, whereas others really are just pure evil. 

Watch out, Stephen King - you've got a challenger for the best horror/suspense writer!

Review: Time Lord Victorious: The Knight, The Fool and The Dead [Science Fiction]

 

Rating: 5/5 stars

The Waters of Mars is my all time favourite Doctor Who episode, partly because of the overall plot, but especially because of these two quotes by the Doctor:

"There are laws of time. Once upon a time there were people in charge of those laws but they died. They all died. Do you know who that leaves? Me! It's taken me all these years to realize that the laws of time are mine and they will obey me!"

and

"For a long time now, I thought I was just a survivor, but I'm not. I'm the winner. That's who I am. The Time Lord victorious."

I've been obsessed with those three words ever since. Time Lord Victorious. There's something so dark, so Master-esque about them, and you bet your arse I've written countless fanfiction where the words Time Lord Victorious features promiently. I've been super annoyed that the words Time Lord Victorious never appeared again in canon since that episode, because god - imagine all that potential!

So when this book was announced - a whole multi-media series based off the concept of the Time Lord Victorious, something that I'd believed was a throwaway line from an episode ten years ago - the concept of this vainglorious Doctor who has the best possible goals and goes about them in the worst possible ways; a white knight with a god complex? Not to mention that this is the Tenth Doctor?

I thought I'd dreamt it.

Seriously. My brain's pretty fucked at the best of times; this wouldn't be the first time. So I Googled it, one hundred percent certain that I must have dreamt this because there is no way that my obsession that I've been hankering after for AN ENTIRE DECADE has actually happened. No way.

Well, way.

Of course, that meant that The Knight, the Fool and the Dead had a lot to live up to. Could it ever reach my expectations, which are somewhere in the vicinity of the stratosphere? Would the Doctor be insane enough, would he be arrogant enough, or would be just be a bit wishy-washy like all the Doctor Who content over the past couple of years? (Jodie, I love you, but Chibnall can't fucking write your character.)

Yes, is the answer. This is the Doctor at his worst from a personality point of view, and therefore the best from a narrative point of view. He goes back to the Dark Times, when Gallifrey was just a speck in the universe's eye, which is ambitious enough as it is.

And then he tries to eliminate Death. From the universe. Forever.

So yes, the Doctor was narcissistic enough for my hungry dark tastes. And against all odds, this definitely lived up to my expectations.

Review: Come Again by Robert Webb [Romance, Drama]

Rating: 5/5 stars!

I got a signed copy of this because I love Robert Webb as an actor - and of course I was nervous that this wouldn't be as good as I hoped. But thankfully, that turned out to not be the same!

Come Again is ostensibly a romance/drama about a woman who was widowed unexpectedly in her 40s, only to wake up and find herself back in university at the age of 18, about to meet her husband for the first time again.

But it's so much more than that - and actually, that plotline doesn't feature quite as prominently as the blurb implies, but that's in some ways a good thing - because that meant I wasn't expecting the suspense part at all!

Some reviewers have said the suspense element was jarring and felt like two different books collaged together, but I think it worked perfectly; both the main threads of the story were entwined together from the very first chapter.

All in all: Highly recommended!

My Favourite Books of 2020

You don’t need me to tell you that this has been a year of unprecedented horribleness, especially for me for all sorts of non-COVID personal reasons. But one thing that wasn’t a giant pile of flaming garbage about 2020 was reading, so here’s a wrap up of my absolute favourite books I’ve read in 2020.

Final Lover – Jocelynn Drake

Final Lover is the third and final book in the Exit Strategy trilogy by Jocelynn Drake. I can’t really say anything at all about the plot, because it will spoil the first two books, but it was a perfect finale. The first book in the series is titled Deadly Lover, and it’s an M/M romance/thriller featuring two assassins used to working alone who have to join forces for a job. Dark and delicious!

Deviant Desire – Jackson Marsh 

An incredibly fun historical mystery with an M/M romance. Long and layered, with fantastic character development, this certainly exceeded my expectations. Strangely enough, however, I simply couldn’t get into the sequel and had to DNF it. Them’s the breaks, kid!

Pendulum – Joel Abernathy 

Another M/M romance – is anyone else detecting a theme here? This time, it’s a paranormal featuring werewolves and vampires, yet somehow Abernathy manages to breathe new life into this trope we have seen a thousand times before. Angsty and dark, this is certainly not a light read, but it’s very worthwhile.

Hush – Tal Bauer 

An incredibly engaging political thriller with, you guessed it, an M/M romance. A masterpiece in character development and suspense, Hush broke my heart and then put it back together again, and it will stay with me for a very long time. I’m definitely going to be looking through the rest of Bauer’s bibliography.

The War Master: Only the Good – Nicholas Briggs et al. 

A Doctor Who spinoff from audioplay masters (no pun intended) Big Finish. The Master is one of my favourite characters in the whole of the Whoniverse, and this collection of four stories certainly did him justice. Derek Jacobi is also an absolutely superlative actor, both on screen and in audio.

Of the City of the Saved... – Philip Purser-Hallard 

The next novel in the Faction Paradox series after the absolutely phenomenal This Town Will Never Let Us Go. Although by a different author and with a completely different style, Of the City of the Saved has the same postmodern, almost psychedelic feel of the first book, with possibly the most intriguing concept I have ever heard: in the City of the Saved, where every single human who has ever lived and will ever live resides in an immortal afterlife, a detective must solve an impossible murder.

The Fever King – Victoria Lee 

This was the YA novel that restored my faith in YA. I don’t read much of it nowadays – ever since I fell outside the intended age range I’ve never been able to get into them as I used to, even though I’m only a couple of years older – but The Fever King was one of my favourite books of 2020, YA or otherwise. It’s set in a post-apocalyptic America that has been decimated by a virus (because I had to read at least one virusy book in 2020) that either kills painfully, or in a very small number of cases, gives you magic. It’s very gritty, and doesn’t fall into the same tired old tropes that lots of YA dystopians do.

Doctor Who: Embrace the Darkness – Nicholas Briggs 

Another Big Finish audio, this time featuring the Eighth Doctor. This is the sort of unsettling, gorgeous gothic sci-fi that only Doctor Who can do, and when it does it right, it does it really well. Although not as popular as Chimes of Midnight, which was released close to Embrace the Darkness and has a similar gothic feel, I enjoyed it far more. Certainly one of the more underrated entries in Big Finish’s Main Range of DW audios.

Featherhood – Charlie Gilmour 

I won’t go into too much detail about this wonderful memoir, as I’ve already written a blog post on it, but this is certainly a must-read.

Violet Bent Backwards Over the Grass – Lana del Rey

I’ve always admired Lana del Rey as a lyricist as well as a singer, so of course I’ve been eagerly anticipating the release of her first poetry book. At a time where overly-minimalist, shallow and surface-level poets such as Rupi Kaur and Amanda Lovelace seem to be the most popular (sorry if you’re a fan, but they’re emphatically not for me) it’s fantastic to see a poet with more complexity and, yes, thought put into her poems. The hardcover is also beautifully presented, the font in a typewriter face and interspersed with del Rey’s photography that’s just as whimsical and quietly melancholy as her poetry.

The Way of Kings – Brandon Sanderson 

I DNF’d this when I first tried to read it in 2015, but since I am a huge Branderson (I’m never going to stop calling him this, so get used to it) fan, I’ve left it quietly waiting on my shelves for the right time – and 2020 was the right time. I honestly have no idea why I DNF’d it, although I was sixteen and I had all sorts of impaired judgement going on at that time. The Way of Kings has the sort of multi-layered narrative, wonderful characters, and one-of-a-kind worldbuilding one expects from Branderson, but as this is the first book in a projected ten-book series, the magic system unfolds far more slowly than in his previous books, leaving shadowy areas of intriguing mystique.