Genre: Science Fiction

Divider

The Memory Tree

This was an interesting book that I’m having trouble gauging how I actually feel about it. The setting and world building, in the parts of the book set in the future, are interesting. The characters are, for the most part, well done. The story overall is intricate and precisely meticulously plotted. Yet, there are things I found challenging about reading it. The main idea of the book, about memories and how they work, and interconnecting the storylines is interesting. The stories flowed together well enough and made the overarching plot of the book interesting and fun to read. Sadly, the book did not stop with just that. There are just too many twists and turns. Each timeline has different characters with different motivations. The book doesn’t just break from the traditional structure of a novel but destroys it. Halfway through the book, it became a slog as I had to… Read more »

The Dragon’s Playlist

I will start by saying the Dragon’s Playlist is possibly one of the best books I’ve read this year. The characters are well developed and captivating, the story moves at a brisk pace and keeps the engrossed even when the story deals with mundane things and elicited real feelings from me as a reader. And considering I read a lot of books to review and have honestly grown a bit jaded when a novel tries to tug at my heart strings, that’s saying something. This book blends the real everyday world with a fantasy element, a style that has worked well over the years. If you think too hard about the fantasy elements, it can come a bit undone, but that applies to most of these types of books. And the book is written skillfully enough that it’s easy to ignore the cracks in the premises when they do show… Read more »

The Ghost Line

The Ghost Line falls in a unique subset of sci-fi that is near and dear to my heart, sci-fi suspense that border on horror. It’s a genre that I love in books, movies and TV (although it is massively underrepresented on television), so I was really looking forward to reading this book. I will start off by saying I generally liked most of what this book did. The characters are interesting, if not exactly unique to the genre, and I liked the fact that the main character was from Iceland. It added a bit extra to her characterization, especially when it casually dropped some lesser known Icelandic folklore into a random conversation. The authors also did a solid job of getting across the emotions of their characters, and from the outset, I felt the almost crazy sneakiness of Wei and the real affection Saga and Michel had for each other…. Read more »

Emerge: The Awakening

Emerge is a fairly standard young adult novel that hits all the boxes on the YA checklist. Thankfully it does so competently and with a plot that is interesting. You have Allie, the girl who is different but even she doesn’t know how different. Read, hidden special powers. The guy she meets that accepts her for who she is, and turns out to be special to. A secrete destiny waiting to be discovered. Formulaic however does not equal bad. Allie is a completely likable character and has an emotional depth which is refreshing to see. Her relationship with Aiden is believable and well done. In a genre where relationships are all to often one dimensional or unbelievable, I was happy to see Craven knew how to avoid these pitfalls. The backstory is also well done. There was a lot thought put into the backstory of the world and while yes,… Read more »

Ex-Heroes

Ex-Heroes is an interesting mashup of two very different book sub-genre’s, super-hero action and the zombie apocalypse. What is even more surprising than the mashup even existing is that it actually works. It seems the difficulty level of this is pretty high, but Clines pulls it off. The story is set after the apocalypse has already happened, so naturally Cline has to spend a lot of time in flashback explaining what happened. Thankfully this doesn’t break up the pacing and works in the narrative fairly well. Most of the books I have read that relied on flashbacks for exposition it did hurt the pacing, so the fact that this book still flows well is a credit to the writer. I found the use of heroes particularly interesting in Ex-Heroes. First is the fact that, even with all their superpowers, they were unable to stop the apocalypse from happening. Superheroes in… Read more »

Star Trek Enterprise: By the Book

This review has moved to http://startrekreadingorder.com/reviews.php?id=1

Train to Nowhere

Train to Nowhere is set in a dystopian future where people are divided into classes and live completely separate from each other. In this future world strict population controls are in place and illegal children, those children that were born outside of the new rules of the society, are placed on the trains known as Orphan Trains. The story follows one of these orphans named Garland, as he strains to see the bigger world outside the train. This book has a lot of good things going for it. First and foremost are the characters, who are well designed and relatable. You can’t help but feel for Garland as he fights between the desire to leave the train and wanting to be with his friends. Or be nervous for him when he finally manages to get into the larger world. The reader is also given a counter in the form of… Read more »

The Eugenics War Vol. 2 – The Rise and Fall of Khan Noonien Singh

The review has moved to http://startrekreadingorder.com/reviews.php?id=7

Three Princes

Imagine a world where the Egyptian civilization never fell; a world where the Pharos still maintained power and a legacy going back generation. That sounds like a pretty good premise for a book, right? I thought so too. Unfortunately while Three Princes has that awesome setup and gets the feel of the world right the actual story just doesn’t hold up. This is a book I really wanted to like. I love Egyptian history and the Egyptian “style” so the idea of bringing that forward into modern times really intrigued me. And that is the big thing this book gets right. Add to that the fact that in the story the Incans also remain and are the Egyptians main adversary and I am totally on board. Ramona Wheeler is very good at describing the world in such a way that you can almost feel it. While the alternate history lover… Read more »

The Martian

This is the obvious analogy, but The Martian by Andy Weir is Robin Caruso in space, on steroids and jacked up on laughing gas. This book sits in a weird place between straight fiction and science fiction. Or rather it is science fiction but much closer to the science end then fiction end. This book doesn’t follow the standard narrative structure, and that really works for it. Three fourths of the story is told through journal entries by the protagonist because, with the exception of a few portions of the book, he has no contacts with anyone else. Most of the story happens through Watney’s inner monologue which sounds like a bad thing but really works. When the story does switch to other characters and a more normal story structure all I wanted was for it to get back to Watney and his journal. The character of Mark Watney is… Read more »