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An Artificial Night by Seanan McGuire. This book was awesome. The first two were good, but they felt...vaguely lacking something? I liked the concept, I liked the characters, I liked the foreshadowing, but the current plot wasn't quite up to the quality of the rest of the book and Toby was pretty much being stupidly suicidal and in denial about it, which isn't my thing. But she grew up a bit in this one, and it feels like it's starting to get serious about things rather than just establishing the world and the situations, and I just loved it. Also, her relationship with her Fetch was awesome. So yay. Plus the scene with her mother in the next book is badass, dudes. I love her mother already. (Yes, I know, it's totally a shock I like a badass older woman who's kinda crazy. Even if she's immortal and gorgeous so it doesn't quite count.)
As a side note though? Authors, can we please ban the whole "her face was striking, not beautiful?" thing? Because man that's getting old and cliched and it mostly feels like a way to have an attractive character without having to admit it.
Life Ascending: The Ten Great Inventions of Evolution by Nick Lane. I finally have a decent book about evolution that I can recommend to the people who ask me for a good starter one! \o\ Most the books on evolution I've read are good, but are either really long, really hard, not all that good, or have way too many random attacks on religion sprinkled throughout for me, or multiple combinations of the above to recommend them for people who want to read a good book on evolution. Before, I tended to rec The Red Queen, but it feels shallow, and that's not really what I want when giving someone a book in a category they haven't read before. I want to give them the exciting stuff, damnit. But this is completely awesome. The ten inventions it covers: the origin of life, DNA, photosynthesis, the complex cell, sex, movement, sight, hot blood, consciousness, death. And it goes into enough detail on each to make me happy and learn some new stuff, and even finally answered the question of how archaea and bacteria are different. ...not that I remember what the answer was! But that's just me.
Also man, a site that I get my bras from (Decent Exposures) just emailed me a day after my order to tell me that I qualified for 10% off my order since I'd bought from her before and the multiple bras discount thing was cumulative. \o\ Less money after I've already ordered makes me happy.
This entry was originally posted at opusculus @ DW. There are currently
comments over there. Feel free to talk over there.
As a side note though? Authors, can we please ban the whole "her face was striking, not beautiful?" thing? Because man that's getting old and cliched and it mostly feels like a way to have an attractive character without having to admit it.
Life Ascending: The Ten Great Inventions of Evolution by Nick Lane. I finally have a decent book about evolution that I can recommend to the people who ask me for a good starter one! \o\ Most the books on evolution I've read are good, but are either really long, really hard, not all that good, or have way too many random attacks on religion sprinkled throughout for me, or multiple combinations of the above to recommend them for people who want to read a good book on evolution. Before, I tended to rec The Red Queen, but it feels shallow, and that's not really what I want when giving someone a book in a category they haven't read before. I want to give them the exciting stuff, damnit. But this is completely awesome. The ten inventions it covers: the origin of life, DNA, photosynthesis, the complex cell, sex, movement, sight, hot blood, consciousness, death. And it goes into enough detail on each to make me happy and learn some new stuff, and even finally answered the question of how archaea and bacteria are different. ...not that I remember what the answer was! But that's just me.
Also man, a site that I get my bras from (Decent Exposures) just emailed me a day after my order to tell me that I qualified for 10% off my order since I'd bought from her before and the multiple bras discount thing was cumulative. \o\ Less money after I've already ordered makes me happy.
This entry was originally posted at opusculus @ DW. There are currently
comments over there. Feel free to talk over there.