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Merissa (13929 KP) rated A Hint of Frost (Araneae Nation #1) in Books
Aug 3, 2017
A Hint of Frost (Araneae Nation #1) by Hailey Edwards
It's not often that someone can do something different with a well known genre but Hailey Edwards has managed it. There are a lot of different clans in this world, all with confusing (to me!) names but the life and spark that Hailey has created is wonderful. There are aspects of this story that I was cringing at to begin with - as you are supposed to! It's written in a way that makes it horribly good. But then as you read more and understand more, you see how something has been abused and debased. It becomes less horrible as an act and more horrible towards the person doing it. Confused? Then give this book a try and see for yourself.
The world is well written and you can tell a lot of thought has been put into this world, the clans in it and the relationships between people, both those of inside and outside the clan. The characters are all very well written and even though it is written from the first person POV, nothing is lost.
This world is too good to read just one book and then leave. The others are now firmly on my T-B-R list.
* Verified Purchase ~ January 2013 *
Merissa
Archaeolibrarian - I Dig Good Books!
The world is well written and you can tell a lot of thought has been put into this world, the clans in it and the relationships between people, both those of inside and outside the clan. The characters are all very well written and even though it is written from the first person POV, nothing is lost.
This world is too good to read just one book and then leave. The others are now firmly on my T-B-R list.
* Verified Purchase ~ January 2013 *
Merissa
Archaeolibrarian - I Dig Good Books!
Goddess in the Stacks (553 KP) rated Hero at the Fall: Rebel of the Sands Book 3 in Books
Jul 5, 2018
This book was great! This is the concluding volume of the Rebel of the Sands trilogy, and it wrapped things up perfectly. I especially liked how she handled character deaths; each one got a short little chapter told in a legendary story kind of way, switching to a third person narrator instead of the first person viewpoint of Amani. The last chapter, telling us what came after the events of the book, was told in the same manner, and I really liked how it tied the book together.
There's so little I can say about this book without spoiling the previous two! We learn even more about the Djinni in this book, and some of the creation myths of Amani's people. We get a little more into the politics of other countries, and even a bit of their magic. And ohhhh there are stories to be told there, if Hamilton wants to continue in this world. I'd love to see a prequel based on Sam, and his country could do an entire sequel trilogy!
I think one of my favorite scenes was Amani using her control of sand to sail their ship across the desert. It's just an amazing visual.
This was one of the best concluding books to a trilogy that I have read in a long time. Fantastic book.
You can find all my reviews at http://goddessinthestacks.wordpress.com
There's so little I can say about this book without spoiling the previous two! We learn even more about the Djinni in this book, and some of the creation myths of Amani's people. We get a little more into the politics of other countries, and even a bit of their magic. And ohhhh there are stories to be told there, if Hamilton wants to continue in this world. I'd love to see a prequel based on Sam, and his country could do an entire sequel trilogy!
I think one of my favorite scenes was Amani using her control of sand to sail their ship across the desert. It's just an amazing visual.
This was one of the best concluding books to a trilogy that I have read in a long time. Fantastic book.
You can find all my reviews at http://goddessinthestacks.wordpress.com
Trouble with the Curve (2012)
6.3
Rate It
Movie Watch
Gus Lobel (Clint Eastwood) has been one of the best scouts in baseball for decades, but, despite his...
Darren Fisher (2465 KP) rated Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy) by Brian Eno in Music
Dec 18, 2020 (Updated Jan 15, 2021)
Eno On Peak
In the 80's I got into Brian Eno via Talking Heads (with the excellent Remain in Light alvum) and David Bowie (Low, Heroes and Lodger), rather than through early Roxy Music.
My first introduction to Eno's solo work was the compilation More Blank Than Frank in 1986, which after listening to, was enough to convince me that I really needed to check out more of his work. I found Taking Tiger Mountain on cassette in the bargain bins at Our Price (I think). No inlay card but it was going cheap. Taking a punt I got it home and was instantly blown away. Musically upbeat for most of its duration, the lyrics told dark, humorous and downright weird tales about espionage, Limbourg Asylum and the rape of a woman by a crazed machine. There's also a lot of references to China (as the album title suggests).
So obssessed by this album I once recycled my smashed up electric guitar body in to a 'skinning up' table (with coaster bed legs so you could push it from person to person). The main centrepiece of this 'table' was a big mound of wax which I attempted to mould into my own Tiger Mountain... Damn the drugs were good back then hahaha 😎✌
Album Highlights:
Burning Airlines Give You So Much More
Third Uncle
The True Wheel
My first introduction to Eno's solo work was the compilation More Blank Than Frank in 1986, which after listening to, was enough to convince me that I really needed to check out more of his work. I found Taking Tiger Mountain on cassette in the bargain bins at Our Price (I think). No inlay card but it was going cheap. Taking a punt I got it home and was instantly blown away. Musically upbeat for most of its duration, the lyrics told dark, humorous and downright weird tales about espionage, Limbourg Asylum and the rape of a woman by a crazed machine. There's also a lot of references to China (as the album title suggests).
So obssessed by this album I once recycled my smashed up electric guitar body in to a 'skinning up' table (with coaster bed legs so you could push it from person to person). The main centrepiece of this 'table' was a big mound of wax which I attempted to mould into my own Tiger Mountain... Damn the drugs were good back then hahaha 😎✌
Album Highlights:
Burning Airlines Give You So Much More
Third Uncle
The True Wheel
That Dragon, Cancer
Games
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An immersive, narrative experience that retells Joel Green’s 4-year fight against cancer through...
Hunting Sasquatch
7.0
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The Wild Animal Channel has put up a bounty of one million dollars for the person or person who can...
BoardGames PartyGames KickstarterGames PressYourLuck
Everneath (Everneath, #1)
5.6
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Last spring, Nikki Beckett vanished, sucked into an underworld known as the Everneath. Now she’s...
Mark @ Carstairs Considers (2526 KP) rated Killers of a Certain Age in Books
Feb 6, 2023 (Updated Feb 6, 2023)
If You Plan to Take Out Killers, Don't Miss
Billie, Mary Alice, Helen, and Natalie have spent their lives working as assassins for a super-secret organization that calls itself the Museum. They have had a successful career individually and as a team, but they are ready to retire now. However, the cruise that the Museum sends them on turns out to be a trap. Now they have to wonder who is out to kill them. And why.
I’ve been hearing good things about this book, so I went in looking forward to it. And I did enjoy it. It reads like an action movie, and there were plenty of scenes that had me turning pages. However, it could have been stronger, with another few twists and turns and slightly stronger characters. The book fits in the action genre in that regard, right? It does have more language and violence than I typically read. It also has plenty that made me smile and laugh as I was reading. Most of the book is written in first person past tense, but we a few chapters flash back to the past and they are written in third person present tense. While I didn’t think this book was quite as good as many others seemed to, I definitely enjoyed it and I’m glad I read it.
I’ve been hearing good things about this book, so I went in looking forward to it. And I did enjoy it. It reads like an action movie, and there were plenty of scenes that had me turning pages. However, it could have been stronger, with another few twists and turns and slightly stronger characters. The book fits in the action genre in that regard, right? It does have more language and violence than I typically read. It also has plenty that made me smile and laugh as I was reading. Most of the book is written in first person past tense, but we a few chapters flash back to the past and they are written in third person present tense. While I didn’t think this book was quite as good as many others seemed to, I definitely enjoyed it and I’m glad I read it.
Hazel (2934 KP) rated The Collective in Books
Jul 31, 2022
A very satisfying tale of revenge that I raced through in quick time.
Unfortunately, we have all heard of cases where a child is abused or found dead, murdered or killed by someone else and the person thought to have committed that atrocity walks free. We all feel for the parents but what would you do if that parent was you? Would you want revenge and how far would you go?
Camille is that parent; her only child is gone and her marriage has ended.
Grief has no time scale and after five years, the pain is still as raw, if not more so as the person she believed murdered her beautiful daughter is walking free and getting on with their lives. She has to do something but what?
Enter the collective ... a secret online group of mainly mothers who will help you get the justice you feel you deserve by working together.
Camille now has purpose but how far will she go?
With a great plot and interesting characters written at a pace that was quite slow at first but increased as the story developed, this book is a great thriller and certainly had me gripped from the start waiting to see how it all turned out.
Thank you must go to The Orion Publishing Group and NetGalley for enabling me to read The Collective and share my views.
Unfortunately, we have all heard of cases where a child is abused or found dead, murdered or killed by someone else and the person thought to have committed that atrocity walks free. We all feel for the parents but what would you do if that parent was you? Would you want revenge and how far would you go?
Camille is that parent; her only child is gone and her marriage has ended.
Grief has no time scale and after five years, the pain is still as raw, if not more so as the person she believed murdered her beautiful daughter is walking free and getting on with their lives. She has to do something but what?
Enter the collective ... a secret online group of mainly mothers who will help you get the justice you feel you deserve by working together.
Camille now has purpose but how far will she go?
With a great plot and interesting characters written at a pace that was quite slow at first but increased as the story developed, this book is a great thriller and certainly had me gripped from the start waiting to see how it all turned out.
Thank you must go to The Orion Publishing Group and NetGalley for enabling me to read The Collective and share my views.
Goddess in the Stacks (553 KP) rated Enchantress of Numbers: A Novel of Ada Lovelace in Books
Apr 2, 2018
Enchantress of Numbers has been making the rounds lately - it seems there's been an interest in books about women in STEM, which is a good thing. Ada Lovelace is considered to be the first computer programmer, though "computers" as we know them didn't really exist at the time. What she wrote was an algorithm for making a machine spit out a specific result - a machine that was never actually built. Still, her contributions to the very early science of computing were invaluable and she is (rightly) revered for them. Sadly, she died in her 30s from ovarian cancer - a loss that undoubtedly slowed down the advancement of early computing.
The early parts of the book are told in third person, about her mother's marriage to Lord Byron, and Ada's own birth. From there, Ada tells the story in first person, as she grows up with her strict mother in English Aristocratic Society.
It is historical fiction, so the author has taken some liberties, though I was a bit confused that in the book she meets Mr. Babbage some time before meeting Mrs. Somerville; Wikipedia says Lady Lovelace was introduced to Mr. Babbage by her mentor, Mrs. Somerville. Odd that the author chose to change that up.
I've definitely read better historical fiction - Philippa Gregory is a personal favorite - but this wasn't bad. It was a little slow, and a little dry in spots, but it was overall good. If you weren't interested in Ada Lovelace or early computing and mathematics I don't think the book would be very enjoyable at all. But if you do like those things, and are willing to put up with a little bit of boredom, it's a decent book.
You can find all my reviews at http://goddessinthestacks.wordpress.com
The early parts of the book are told in third person, about her mother's marriage to Lord Byron, and Ada's own birth. From there, Ada tells the story in first person, as she grows up with her strict mother in English Aristocratic Society.
It is historical fiction, so the author has taken some liberties, though I was a bit confused that in the book she meets Mr. Babbage some time before meeting Mrs. Somerville; Wikipedia says Lady Lovelace was introduced to Mr. Babbage by her mentor, Mrs. Somerville. Odd that the author chose to change that up.
I've definitely read better historical fiction - Philippa Gregory is a personal favorite - but this wasn't bad. It was a little slow, and a little dry in spots, but it was overall good. If you weren't interested in Ada Lovelace or early computing and mathematics I don't think the book would be very enjoyable at all. But if you do like those things, and are willing to put up with a little bit of boredom, it's a decent book.
You can find all my reviews at http://goddessinthestacks.wordpress.com