Doctor Who, Television

Doctor Who is off to an okay-ish start with “The Magician’s Apprentice”

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I’m a little surprised to say that I rather enjoyed “The Magician’s Apprentice.” It’s a very Moffat episode, which isn’t surprising since it was written by the show runner, but it manages to not be awful. That said, I feel like this should be a kind of good news/bad news sort of review.

The good news is that Missy is back, and she’s as delightful as ever. It’s really obvious that Michelle Gomez is having a ball with this role. The bad news is that Missy’s return doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, and her antics become grating after the first five minutes or so before she–in a fit of pique–does something evil enough that it’s no longer possible to classify her behavior as “antics” at all.

The good news is that Clara seems to be doing alright. She’s still teaching, and it’s nice to see that she didn’t have any inexplicable career change, and she’s apparently also working for UNIT, although it’s not clear exactly what her role there is, and it’s, frankly, not clear why UNIT appears in this episode at all. The bad news is that, with the introduction of Missy into the mix, Clara has basically nothing to do because Steven Moffat seems to be incapable of writing parts for two women in the same episode. Mostly, Clara spends the episode making disapproving faces about stuff that Missy does.

Another bit of good news about Clara, though, is that this entire episode passed by without a single instance of the Doctor commenting on her face, body, or age in a demeaning manner. The bad news is that Clara and the Doctor barely interacted at all, and none of it was memorable or interesting.

More good news? Clara might be canonically bisexual! Bad news? You could have blinked and missed her line about Jane Austen being a good kisser–which, by the way, would be a totally bizarre thing for a teacher to just say to a room full of twelve-year-olds who don’t know their teacher is a time traveler.

The thing is, this was a pretty okay episode. It’s not great, and it’s got a lot of the regular Moffat nonsense going on, but I enjoyed it more than I did any of last season’s episodes except maybe “Robot of Sherwood” (not because it was good but because I love Robin Hood). I think this episode might be more exciting for those who are more familiar with Classic Who than I am; I know my partner, who grew up watching the show, was much more excited than I was, although I at least remembered who Davros was.

The biggest problem I’m already sensing with Season 9–admittedly judging just from this episode and the titles and descriptions of the rest of the season–is that Moffat still seems obsessed with having the Doctor facing his “darkest hour” at least two or three times a year. At the end of “The Magician’s Apprentice” the Doctor is left without his screwdriver, his TARDIS, or his friends, but it just feels a bit ho-hum when we already know that this is just the first of several anticlimaxes to come. 

The best news I’ve seen about this episode so far? Apparently, Steven Moffat’s tenure as show runner isn’t just wearing thin with mean old feminists like myself. Viewership for this episode was down by almost a third (from 6.8 to 4.6 million viewers) from the first episode of last season. People have been suggesting for years that Moffat is going to run Doctor Who into the ground, and these numbers don’t seem promising. Maybe this means that Moffat’s time with the show will be coming to an end sooner rather than later, and maybe that would clear the way for someone new to come in and make the show really good again. I’d love to have something better to say about it than “it wasn’t the worst.”

Weekend Links

Weekend Links: September 19, 2015

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Today is Talk Like a Pirate Day, and Mental Floss has a great post up about the origins of several of the most common pirate stereotypes. Spoiler: They can all, one way or another, be attributed to Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island.

I love Halloween, and we’re about a month into Ugly Decorations I Nonetheless Desperately Want Season. Unfortunately, there’s not enough room on my balcony for these zombie flamingos. I might have room for this skeleton cat, though.

Speaking of cats:

In much more serious news, and in light of the Emmy awards being tomorrow, a 10-year study has found–to no one’s surprise–that women are terribly underrepresented at the Emmys.

In infuriating (but also somewhat hilarious) news, The Sarkeesian Effect has been released. You can pay $3.99 to watch it on Vimeo, but I suggest just reading about it over at We Hunted the Mammoth.

Nichelle Nichols went to space, and there were tribbles there.

At io9, Why Captain Kirk is Still One of the Greatest Space Heroes of All Time.

At Kirkus, a History of Serialized Science Fiction and Fantasy.

Suvudu takes on another era of genre history and publishes a nice piece on Lord Dunsany.

The AV Club explains feminist media criticism for those who still don’t get it.

The Mary Sue on The Importance of Race Bending in Fan Art.

Geek.com lists 11 Genres and Subgenres That Need to Make a Comeback. I would love to see a good new sword and planet story.

The Toast presents A High Fantasy Novel Without Incestuous Subtext.

Tor.com announced the 2015 Quantum Shorts flash fiction competition, in association with Nature and Scientific American. You can see the full rules of the competition and submit your work at the official website.

Margaret Atwood writes about freedom (or lack thereof) at The Guardian.

At Tor.com, How Evil SFF Empires Create Ideal Citizens.

It’s been a couple of weeks since I read an interview with Ursula K. LeGuin, but this week there were two: at Huffington Post and Salon.

I’m just going to give up now on ever having another Puppy-free weekend links post:

 

 

 

 

Television

What I will be (and you should be) watching this fall

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So, it took me most of a summer of watching light fare to recover from this last season of Game of Thrones, but I think I’m more or less ready for watching and writing about some new television this fall. I won’t be writing about everything I watch, obviously, and there are a couple of things I intend to write about that I don’t know if I’ll be able to stick with–that could end up like my watching and posting about Killjoys did this summer; I still haven’t watched the last two episodes of that show, I was so bored/frustrated with it.

Here’s the plan:

The Mindy Project – Tuesdays on Hulu starting 9/15. I honestly love this show, and I will watch it til the end of time, although I rarely write about it outside of a line or two on Tumblr. The first episode of season four is excellent, and the first three seasons are available to stream on Hulu as well so it’s not too late too catch up if you’re really dedicated.

Doctor Who – Saturdays on BBC America starting 9/19. Doctor Who is another show I just can’t quit. It’s also one that I intend to write about this year, although I haven’t had much positive to say about it during Steven Moffat’s tenure as showrunner. I’m not making any promises about this one, though. Right now, my goal is to have my Doctor Who post up on Monday mornings, but I’m not going to destroy myself over this show the way I do over Game of Thrones. If it gets too insufferable, I will likely switch to just watching it.

Minority Report – Mondays on Fox starting 9/21. Frankly, I’m already bored by this series, but I’ll probably check out the first episode or two just to confirm my suspicion that it makes no sense. I’m pretty sure the whole point of Minority Report was that the whole pre-crime thing is a terrible idea and this show seems to be presupposing that–maybe it isn’t? Okaaaay.

Scream Queens – Tuesdays on Fox starting 9/22. This show is relevant to basically all of my interests. And it has Jamie Lee Curtis. I’m currently planning to write about this one on Wednesdays.

Heroes Reborn – Thursdays on NBC starting 9/24. This show is basically not relevant to anything. No one wanted or asked for it. But it’s a thing that is happening. Since I loved the first season of Heroes as well as anybody, I will be watching this, but I’ll only be writing about it if it’s really good or really comically terrible.

Bob’s Burgers – Sundays on Fox starting 9/27. Love it. Watch it with my family. Will almost never post anything about it except gifs of Tina on Tumblr.

Brooklyn Nine-Nine – Sundays on Fox starting 9/27. Also love, but also won’t write about unless something major happens.

iZombie – Tuesdays on the CW starting 10/6. The first season of this show was a little uneven, and I wasn’t totally thrilled with the way it ended, but I plan to tune in again this year and write about it some more. Depending on how things pan out, I may end up choosing between this and Scream Queens to write about, though. Just, realistically, I’m not sure I have it in me to write about more than one show a day, especially as I’ve got a lot of reading that I want to do over the next few months as well.

Jane the Virgin – Mondays on the CW starting 10/12. I won’t write about this show (mostly because it’s basically perfect), but it’s another one that we watch as a family and I can’t wait.

Supergirl – Mondays on CBS starting 10/26. I kind of dislike most super hero stuff, but this show looks completely charming. I’m currently planning to write about it.

Ash vs. Evil Dead – Saturdays on Starz starting 10/31. This show is definitely what I am doing on Halloween. I’m not sure if I will write about it or not. It depends on how good this show is and how bad this season of Doctor Who is.

Into the Badlands – Sundays on AMC starting 11/15. This show is almost certainly awful, but I’m kind of interested in it anyway. No plans to write about it.

The Man in the High Castle – On Amazon Prime starting 11/20. I haven’t read the Philip K. Dick novel this series is based upon, but the trailer for the show looks promising. I’m hoping to read the book sometime over the next couple of months, and then I might watch the show.

Jessica Jones – On Netflix starting 11/20. Another Marvel show. I’m somewhat looking forward to this one, but I haven’t even finished Daredevil yet, so there’s no telling when I’ll get around to it. I do really like Krysten Ritter, though.

Childhood’s End – On SyFy starting 12/14. I read this book over the summer, and I totally understand why it’s one of the great sci-fi novels. I also totally have no faith in this adaptation of it. It looks legit awful, and I’m a little embarrassed for SyFy about it. I’ll definitely be watching it, though. And I expect that I’ll write some about it, too. I think it’s going to be just that enraging.

The Expanse – On SyFy starting 12/14. I’m somewhat more optimistic about this show, although I haven’t read the source material (and don’t really intend to unless the show is really good). I’ve no idea whether I’ll write about it or not. It depends on whether I have any feelings about it strong enough to be worth sharing.

I’m really disappointed that the new shows that seem intended to capitalize on the popularity of Game of Thrones-esque, gritty, dark medieval European settings (The Bastard Executioner and The Last Kingdom) both look boring as shit. I’m actually a pretty big fan of the gritty medieval stuff, but I have no desire to watch shows that look to be almost entirely devoid of women. Game of Thrones might hate its women, but at least they exist there.

In all honestly, the shows I’m most looking forward to this fall are all returning favorites. The new stuff that’s coming out isn’t that exciting, with a couple of exceptions, and a solid half of it looks actively bad. I figure I’ll try a few new things, though. Worst case scenario, everything is terrible and I end up reading more books instead.

Book Reviews, Fantasy

Book Review: The Library at Mount Char by Scott Hawkins

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So, I’ve gotten pretty good at picking books to read these days so that I have a minimal number of bad reading experiences, which is great, and it’s a skill I’m happy to have finally mastered as I approach my mid-30s. The downside of this skill, however, is that I often feel like about every other book that I read is a new favorite, or my favorite book of [genre], or at least my favorite book of the current year, or the last six months or last five years, or whatever. You get the idea. The point is, eventually that “favorite” distinction starts to lose all meaning, especially since I seldom reread anything anymore. But still, sometimes I really mean it.

This time, I really, really mean it.

The Library at Mount Char is certainly my favorite book that I’ve read this summer, perhaps my favorite this year so far. It’s not the best book I’ve read lately, but it’s definitely the most fun I’ve had reading in a good while. Absolutely enough fun to earn itself a place on the running list of “favorites” I keep in my head.

I knew straight away that I would love this book because I was moved to giggles in the first paragraph, which introduces us to a protagonist who only gets more weird and wonderful as you continue reading. I don’t know if The Library at Mount Char will last as one of my favorites, but its heroine, Carolyn, definitely makes my list of all-time favorite female characters.

We first meet Carolyn covered in blood and walking barefoot down a highway. She’s just killed a man, but she’s actually thinking about tacos. I fell in love with her immediately.

We soon learn that Carolyn is one of twelve “librarians” who started off as orphaned children adopted by a mysterious “Father” and taken to live in a library. Father isn’t a god, exactly, but he’s something of an all-powerful and ancient wizard kind of guy. Each of the twelve adopted siblings has been assigned a catalog–one portion of Father’s incredibly vast body of knowledge–that they alone are responsible for, and to study from another’s catalog brings a heavy punishment. Carolyn’s catalog is languages. Michael’s is animals. David’s is war. Jennifer’s is healing. Margaret’s is death. Other siblings’ roles are less obvious or well-defined, but it’s obvious that, all together, the breadth of their studies is pretty comprehensive. The story begins with Father’s disappearance and the librarians scrambling to figure out what has happened.

Although there are a couple of other important point of view characters–Erwin and Steve–Carolyn is undeniably the main character, and Carolyn is who I found most compelling and interesting to read about, even from other characters’ point of view. She’s a smart and resourceful woman, and she’s self-reliant in a way that I found refreshing. Her flaws are real and serious–never cute or quirky, although Scott Hawkins writes about all of his characters with a dry sort of humor that had me laughing aloud more than once. Due to her unusual upbringing, Carolyn’s not always great at being human. She can be narcissistic and is sometimes callously cruel, and she has to fuck up big time before she becomes who she needs to be by the end of the book.

This, I think, is what I like best about Carolyn. She’s allowed to be kind of awful in a way that female characters often aren’t, and there’s not a hint of apology for her in the text. She’s not always relatable or sympathetic, the mistakes she makes have terrible consequences, and she actually does some things that are kind of evil, but at no point was I not on Carolyn’s side. Every step of the way I was cheering for her to be successful in her ultimate goal (which is a pretty amazing goal that I’m not going to spoil).

Hawkins’ prose is perhaps just workmanlike, but he has a knack for capturing hyperviolence as well as humor and even some very tender moments in an almost naturalistic way. The world he’s created doesn’t feel real exactly, but it feels alive and lived in, with just a hint of high camp in in the details. The action scenes have a cinematic quality to them that makes me hope that someone gets the rights to film this story (although I think it would require a tv miniseries to do it properly). Overall, there’s an absurdist quality and a kitschiness to the novel that I found deeply enjoyable. And while the prose may not be especially beautiful, it’s highly readable and the story is structured in such a way that I didn’t want to put the book down at all (which is why I read it less than a day, in basically two long sessions).

The Library at Mount Char is definitely a book I will be evangelizing for this fall and winter, and I’m actually looking forward to reading it again myself, perhaps closer to Halloween when the nights are longer and colder and I can curl up under a blanket with this book and a warm drink. In the meantime, I’ll be suggesting to everyone I know that they read this book that way.

Do it. You won’t regret it.

Book Reviews, Fantasy

Book Review: The House of Shattered Wings by Aliette de Bodard

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debodard-houseofshatteredwings1
One thing the book DOES have going for it, at least, is gorgeous cover art in both the UK (left) and US (right).

I want so much to say that I loved The House of Shattered Wings, but I actually found it a little disappointing. Aliette de Bodard’s On a Red Station, Drifting is one of my all time favorite novellas, and I really enjoyed her Obsidian and Blood trilogy even though I’m not usually into the magical detective genre, but The House of Shattered Wings just didn’t really impress me. Which sucks, because there’s not much I dislike more than being let down by a book I’ve been so highly looking forward to.

Not that The House of Shattered Wings is a particularly bad book, either. It just doesn’t quite manage to deliver on its really excellent concept. This is primarily because, in the end, it turns out to be an awfully shallow book. This shallowness is characteristic of de Bodard’s previous novel-length work as well, but I think it worked for Obsidian and Blood because the setting there (15th century Tenochtitlan) was so unique and the genre (sort of a magical noir detective thing) of that series is largely plot- rather than either setting- or character-driven. Unfortunately, in The House of Shattered Wings the plot is thin, and the book is dragged further down by shoddy world-building and poor characterization.

As with de Bodard’s earlier work, one of the things that most attracted my to this book was the description of its setting in the cover copy. Post-apocalyptic Paris? After some kind of devastating magical war? With fallen angels involved? Sounds awesome! Except it just never manages to come to life on the page. Everything feels just a bit sterile, too contrived and theatrical to feel real.

The characters as well are all a bit flat and underdeveloped. Madeleine and Philippe have the most potential, but it’s all squandered by the fairly predictable ending of the book. Isabelle is the character that I found most compelling, but she’s never a point of view character, so we don’t get to know her very well and her thoughts and motivations remain largely opaque. Selene, on the other hand, is a character who might have benefited from being left more mysterious. In general, I felt like every revelation about all of the characters was more to do with their history than anything they were actually going through in the book. And that history sounds a lot better to read about than the story de Bodard decided to tell.

The setting might as well be a flat painted backdrop for all the depth it has; the characters were dull and without much growth; and while there are a lot of potentially neat story details and some very cool ideas about magic and religion and colonization and identity, none of them are ever quite done the justice they deserve. I didn’t hate The House of Shattered Wings, and I may check out its sequel when that comes out, but I will probably just be paying more attention to de Bodard’s short fiction for a while instead.

Weekend Links

Weekend Links: September 12, 2015

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“Not even the zombie apocalypse can stop George R.R. Martin from releasing books.”

New tumblr nihilisa-frank is my favorite new thing this week.

Another study has found that women and men make up basically equal portions of the gaming community. Also that women play mostly the same games men play. Unsurprisingly, this will never convince the hordes of sad man children who believe, possibly because they and their friends are so repulsive to women that we don’t hang out with them, that women don’t play games.

Today, in things I want: Star Trek printed EVERYTHING.

Speaking of Star Trek, it’s been around for 49 years as of September 8! The Barnes & Noble Sci-Fi and Fantasy blog has a list of 12 books to read if you’re in the mind to celebrate.

Black Girls are Magic Lit Mag is a new literary magazine that will be focused on stories of the SFF persuasion by and about black girls. They will be accepting submissions starting Sept. 14.

The Book Smugglers newest SFF in Conversation is about culture, history and novels and features Aliette de Bodard, Zen Cho, Kate Elliot, Cindy Pon, and Tade Thompson.

Black Nerd Problems calls for no more diversity panels.

At Feministe, a follow up to a question asked at a Dragon Con panel: on female heroes and feminity.

Feminist Fiction asks, “Does Cersei’s Walk of Shame deserve an Emmy?”

The Toast discusses the problem with Trillian in Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s Guide books. My favorite part, which happens to be totally accurate:

Trillian has never been able to escape being buffeted by conventions and expectations. When she’s good, she’s either a spoof on the “token girl” or a by-the-numbers Strong Female Character. When she’s bad, she’s a security hole – a way for lazy, shitty tropes about women to hitch a ride, Ford Prefect-style, on a series that otherwise bucks cliché.

And because this Hugo Awards stuff is just never going to die:

Books

The SF Bluestocking 2015 Fall Reading List

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I didn’t read as much this summer as I’d hoped to, but I think I’m finally coming out of my reading slump. With my daughter back in school, my days are my own again, and I’ve already been able to start reading and writing more. I’m not 100% certain about what I’ll be doing this fall, as I am beginning to look for a new day job after a couple of years of staying home, but right now my fall reading plan is pretty ambitious, mostly because there’s just an amazing amount of great stuff coming out over the next few months.

Currently, I’m finishing up Cixin Liu’s The Dark Forest, which was on my summer reading list. I should be done with it in a day or so, and then I’ll be moving along to Margaret Atwood’s The Heart Goes Last so I can be sure to have it finished and post my review prior to its September 29 release date.

After that, I’ve got an ARC of An Apprentice to Elves by Elizabeth Bear and Sarah Monette that archives on NetGalley on October 13th, so that’s kind of a priority. I didn’t realize that one was the third book in a trilogy (I was drawn in by the gorgeous cover, mostly), so I’ll probably have to read the first two books as well. Unfortunately, I’ve recently read some negative reviews of the first two books that make me think this series might not be my cup of tea. If I do read these, it will be before the end of September, but I might not.

Probably my biggest plan and the thing I’m most looking forward to this fall is to read all of Tor.com’s new novellas that are being published one every week or so between now and November. The one I can’t wait for is Binti by Nnedi Okorafor, but I’m excited about all of them. There are ten in total, with publishing dates from September 1 to November 17. The big question, for me, is do I want to collect all the paperbacks or do I want to just buy the ebooks, which are much cheaper, and only get paper copies of my favorites?

In any case, the tentative plan (in the hopes that I really am out of my slump) is that I want to read one novella plus one or two novel-length works (or sometimes graphic novels/comics) each week between now and Thanksgiving. On the list so far:

Comics/graphic novels:

  • The Wicked + The Divine
  • Ms. Marvel
  • Ody-C
  • Rat Queens
  • Lumberjanes

A few leftovers from my summer reading list that aren’t necessarily priorities but that I do intend to read soonish:

  • The Magicians by Lev Grossman
  • The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro
  • Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel

I am also super stoked about the Nightmare Magazine Queers Destroy Horror special issue in October. Queers Destroy Science Fiction was really excellent, and I loved all of last year’s Women Destroy issues, so I expect this one to be up to the same high standard. And just in time for Halloween!

My fall list isn’t quite as diverse in terms of authors as my summer one was, but it’s a good mix of different types of books. I’m really looking forward to having some comics in the mix as well. It’s going to be a good season, I think.

Weekend Links

Weekend Links: September 5, 2015

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Imgur user CarlosDanger101 has drawn a ton of Game of Thrones characters in the style of Bob's Burgers. The Lannisters, of course, are objectively the best, but you can head over to Imgur to see them all.
Imgur user CarlosDanger101 has drawn a ton of Game of Thrones characters in the style of Bob’s Burgers. The Lannisters, of course, are objectively the best, but you can head over to Imgur to see them all.

In sad/exciting news this week, Aidan Moher announced the closing of A Dribble of Ink. However, he’s already got a new website up and running so we can see what he does next.

In case you missed it, this week saw the release of a brand new Feminist Frequency video, “Tropes vs. Women: Women as Reward.”

It’s September now! And there are guides to this month’s new releases at both io9 and My Bookish Ways.

My own fall reading list will be coming out in a few days, but in the meantime you can check out my Summer Reading List Report.

I know we’d all like to be done with the Hugo Awards controversy, and I’m hoping that this is my last round of links about it until, oh, January or so, but there are a few worthwhile reads about it this week:

This has been a good week for interviews with authors I’m interested in.

The Mary Sue was on a roll this week, with several excellent reads:

Black Gate published a nice piece: “Cixin Liu the Superstar: How Taking a Risk on a Chinese Author Paid of Big For Tor”

At Tor.com, “The Dragonlance Reread: Guest Highlord Erin Lindsey On Fun Fantasy”

Book Riot has a great piece about the authors we hypothetically like. For me, it’s Kate Elliot–I keep reading her stuff and just never quite manage to love it the way I feel I ought to, no matter how much it ticks off boxes on my list of things I love to read.

Black Girl Nerds: “Why Black Science Fiction Studies Matter”

Geek Mom: “When the ‘Strong Female’ Trope Becomes the ‘Emotionally Unavailable’ Trope”

At io9, Lavie Tidhar writes about “What Happened When I Set Out to Celebrate Science Fiction From Around the World”

Fantasy Faction published Part Two of their series on Gender and Stereotyping in Fantasy. (Part One here.)

The Wertzone is up to Part 7 in a series on the history of epic fantasy.

At Vice, “How Dungeons & Dragons Went Mainstream”

 

Book Reviews, Books, Fantasy

Book Review: The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin

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N.K. Jemisin’s The Fifth Season is probably the book I’ve been looking forward to the most this year (it’s at least tied with Catherynne Valente’s Radiance), and it’s hands-down the best book I’ve read so far in 2015. I mean, I’m still totally devastated by it like a week after finishing it, but in a good way.

Even the prologue of this book–and I mostly despise prologues–is equal parts harrowing and thrilling. It does a great job of setting the mood for the next 500 pages, and when it’s put in proper context by reading the rest of the book–and I highly recommend going back and rereading the prologue when you’re done–it’s even more impressive.

The Stillness is one of the most unique fantasy worlds created in recent years. I love the idea of the world being wracked by repeated apocalypses, and Jemisin’s imagining of the sorts of cultures and societal structures that might arise as a way of dealing with such an unpredictable environment is sensible and richly detailed. The magic, orogeny, is wonderfully creative, well-conceived, and beautifully executed throughout the novel. I especially liked the terminology used to describe orogeny and orogenes. Especially notable are the differences in the ways that different characters talk about orogeny, including the ways in which the book’s orogene characters talk and think about themselves. Even the slur, “rogga,” works well precisely because it’s so reminiscent of other, more familiar slurs.

At the same time, however, there is no symbolism or allegory here. The orogenes are not a metaphor. Rather, Jemisin uses the fantastic to create a picture of something real and true about humanity, but free of any obvious real-world parallels (although not without identifiable real-world and literary inspiration). The Stillness is not a mirror of our world or a vision of our future. Instead it’s an exquisitely original fantasy world peopled with characters that are deeply and often heartrendingly human.

The story is broken up into three narrative threads: that of Essun, a mother of a dead son and a missing daughter who is searching for her murderous husband; that of Damaya, an orogene child; and that of Syenite, a young orogene on an important mission. Damaya and Syenite’s stories are told from a fairly close third-person point of view, but it’s the second person point of view used for Essun’s sections that is the most arresting part of the novel. Essun is absolutely captivating, and the second-person point of view works to make the reader intensely involved in the story, grants a sense of immediacy to the narrative, but also creates just enough detachment so that one isn’t completely overwhelmed with all the things that Essun is dealing with.

Even still, Essun’s story just destroyed me, and I’m torn between wishing desperately for the next book in the series and thinking that it’s probably best that I’ll have a year or so to recover before then.

The Fifth Season is one of those rare fantasy novels that manages to be both an incredible triumph of world-building and amazing character-driven story. It’s a smart, inventive, fast moving book that deftly weaves together its fractured narratives to create a nearly flawless gem of storytelling. I have loved everything I’ve read by N.K. Jemisin, but this book really is a masterpiece.

Sci-fi and Fantasy books, tv, films, and feminism