August 2021 archive

The Red-Haired Woman by Orhan Pamuk

The Red-Haired Woman by Orhan Pamuk

One of Orhan Pamuk‘s great virtues as a storyteller is his ability to create situations in which several different versions of reality are all possible within the narrative that he has established, and it is — at least for a time — left to the reader to decide which one is the truth of the tale, or …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/08/14/the-red-haired-woman-by-orhan-pamuk/

Fugitive Telemetry by Martha Wells

Fugitive Telemetry by Martha Wells

Humans didn’t generally turn up dead on Preservation Station. It was a low-violence society where most people’s needs were well met. As the SecUnit mostly formerly known as Murderbot puts it, “This junction, and Preservation Station in general, were also weird places for humans to get killed; the threat assessment for both transients and station …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/08/13/fugitive-telemetry-by-martha-wells/

Like Other Girls by Britta Lundin

A coming-of-age novel with a queer country girl narrator playing sports and learning to interrogate her internalized misogyny while embracing who she is despite the opposition of certain members of her small town, including her nearest and dearest? I was wholly on-board even before I started reading Britta Lundin’s terrific, lived-in prose, and now I …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/08/12/like-other-girls-by-britta-lundin/

The House on Marshland by Louise Glück

House on Marshland by Louise Glück

In her note at the start of The First Four Books of Poems, Louise Glück writes of her goals before and after The House on Marshland: “After Firstborn, I set myself the task of making poems as single sentences, having found myself trapped in fragments. After The House on Marshland, I tried to wean myself …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/08/11/the-house-on-marshland-by-louise-gluck/

Magical History Tour #4: The Crusades by Fabrice Erre & Sylvain Savoia

If I’m being perfectly honest, I did not go into this book with the highest of expectations. Papercutz is not the most culturally sensitive of publishers (and not in a malicious way, just in a, perhaps, homogenous viewpoints sort of way,) so I was definitely braced for the worst as a Muslim reader and mom. …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/08/10/magical-history-tour-4-the-crusades-by-fabrice-erre-sylvain-savoia/

The Unspoken Name by A.K. Larkwood

A.K. Larkwood delivers her readers into a deliciously pulpy setting right from the start: “In the deep wilds of the north, there is a Shrine cut into the mountainside. The forest covers these hills like a shroud. This is a quiet country, but the Shrine of the Unspoken One is quieter still. Birds and insects …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/08/09/the-unspoken-name-by-a-k-larkwood/

A Deadly Education by Naomi Novik

A Deadly Education by Naomi Novik

Naomi Novik opens A Deadly Education with what ought to be a perfect narrative hook: “I decided Orion needed to die after the second time he saved my life.” (p, 3) Who’s speaking? Who’s Orion? Why does the narrator want to kill him? And why the second time he saved the narrator’s life? The narrator …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/08/08/a-deadly-education-by-naomi-novik/

The Wild Ones by Nafiza Azad

I really enjoyed the feminist lessons of this novel — girls, don’t be afraid to be angry, to be wild, to scream! — but oh my goodness, did I want to take a red pencil to the fantasy aspects and just tighten everything up so it all fit into its own internal logic! Centuries ago, …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/08/05/the-wild-ones-by-nafiza-azad/

The Dead And The Dark by Courtney Gould

I was genuinely creeped out by parts of this horror/mystery tale, which is saying a lot because most horror novels don’t scare me at all! Courtney Gould certainly knows how to build tension, even if I wasn’t 100% convinced by the Big Bad-related world-building. The rest of it, tho, is pretty great, especially in its examination …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/08/03/the-dead-and-the-dark-by-courtney-gould/

Lola’s Super Club #2: My Substitute Teacher Is A Witch by Christine Beigel & Pierre Foiullet

I liked Volume 2 of Lola’s Super Club a bit more than Vol 1, tho I think that’s due in large part to being more prepared for the absurdist humor of this title, which may or may not be to everyone’s taste. Overall, I think the quality of both art and gags were better here, …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/08/02/lolas-super-club-2-my-substitute-teacher-is-a-witch-by-christine-beigel-pierre-foiullet/