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2018

2018 Ardis Discussion Questions Fantasy Young Adult

Book Club Discussion Questions: Six of Crows

written by Ardis

In 2018, Leigh Bardugo released her novel Six of Crows. It’s the first story in a new series, taking place in her previously-established universe known as the Grishaverse. Six of Crows has been very well-received, and I know first-hand that there’s a lot for a discerning book club to discuss in this book. Whether your book club is preparing to discuss it, or you’ve read it on your own and are looking for more, I hope the questions below will help guide you.

Note: If you haven’t read Six of Crows, you can read my review of it here.

Please let me know if you use these questions, find them helpful, or think I missed something. And of course I would love to see your answers to any (or all) of these questions in the comments. Happy discussing!

Of course, MAJOR SPOILER WARNINGS below:

January 15, 2019 0 comment

2018 Ardis Fantasy Short Story Collection

The Book of Magic is a Wonderful Short Story Collection

written by Ardis

The collection The Book of Magic, edited by Gardner Dozois, is a very nicely-curated collection of short stories all having to do with (you guessed it) Magic.

Of the 17 of short stories included in this collection, I gave five of them four or five stars, three of them three or fewer stars, and DNFed the remaining five. Clearly, much of this collection simply wasn’t for me. However, I cannot deny that most (if not all) of the included works are superb examples of their genre.

January 10, 2019 1 comment

2018 Ardis Fantasy Young Adult

Six of Crows is an Energetic and Entertaining Adventure

written by Ardis

Inej would find her own way in. The rules of fair play along the gangs were from Per Haskell’s time. Besides, she was the Wraith – the only law that applied to her was gravity, and some days she defied that, too.

Leigh Bardugo’s Six of Crows is a new story in her well-established fantasy universe known as the Grishaverse. Having not read any of her previous works in this universe, I was surprised and pleased to find that this book did an excellent job of introducing the unique magic system her universe hinges on (and is named for) without dipping into any textbook or encyclopedia-style descriptions. Readers new to Bardugo need not fear – Six of Crows is an excellent place to begin.

As a typical heist story, Six of Crows hits every mark. It has the large cast of rich characters each with their job to do and each with their private motivations – which Bardugo links together artfully and entertainingly as the story unfolds. It has the high stakes, the bad guys, the complicated plots and machinations. It has the breath-baitingly, nerve-wrackingly difficult tasks. And it has plenty of well-timed comedic and touching moments to wrap it all into one lovely narrative.

January 8, 2019 1 comment

2018 Ardis Science Fiction

European Travel for the Monstrous Gentlewoman – Another Thrilling Victorian Adventure

written by Ardis

This is a review of the sequel to 2017’s the Strange Case of the Alchemist’s Daughter. You can read my review of that first book here. Please note that the following review might contain minor spoilers for its predecessor.

“If something goes wrong, give a signal of some sort – wave a handkerchief out the window, for example. They will contact me, and I will contact Sigmund to get you out. Hannah and I will work on a plan to rescue Lucinda. Our best bet is probably blackmailing one of the guards … Don’t worry,” she said as they all sat around the table, worrying. “We’ll figure it out. We always do.”

European Travel for the Monstrous Gentlewoman is the second installment of Theodora Goss’s series The Extraordinary Adventures of the Athena Club. I was an unreserved fan of the first book, the Strange Case of the Alchemist’s Daughter, and dove into this book eagerly.

To a great extent this book is a perfect successor, carrying the legacy of the first book’s accomplishments in Victorian style.

November 6, 2018 0 comment

2018 Ardis Ardis's Favorite Books Reviews Science Fiction

Becky Chambers Inspires Once More with Record of a Spaceborn Few

written by Ardis

This story is nominated for a Hugo award for best novel, to be announced on August 18th. Click the link above to view the other nominees, and to keep track of the award itself.

Our species doesn’t operate by reality. It operates by stories. Cities are a story. Money is a story. Space was a story, once. A king tells us a story about who we are and why we’re great, and that story is enough to make us go kill people who tell a different story. Or maybe the people kill the king because they don’t like his story and have begun to tell themselves a different one.

It’s no secret that I’m completely “ride or die” for Becky Chambers and her Wayfarers series, and Record of a Spaceborn Few is further affirmation of what A Closed and Common Orbit cemented (read my review here), what The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet began. Like the two before it, Chambers’ latest book tells a fresh, personal story set in the world she first described in 2014’s Wayfarers #1.

Note: This is a standalone story set it the world and the continuity of the Wayfarers series, and does not directly reference any of the characters in the previous two books.

This time, we readers are finally getting up close with the oft-referenced human travelers, the Exodans. This story follows four (or five) characters living in the Exodus Fleet, which has long since left its mission to travel the stars behind it and entered a permanent orbit around a small sun. The Exodan community faces many challenges, mainly stemming from the necessities of living in the closed environment of the fleet. Complicating this are two factors: 1) Exodans by-and-large insist on perpetuating as insular a lifestyle as possible, wanting to be self-contained and self-sufficient, and 2) more Exodans leave the fleet to seek life elsewhere in the Universe than come back to rejoin their old home. In addition, the remains of an exploded Exodus ship are in orbit with the rest of the fleet, casting a permanent dark cloud over Exodan life and standing as a reminder of how fragile, how tenuous, life in the fleet truly is.

August 28, 2018 1 comment

2018 Ardis Science Fiction Uncategorized

Semiosis: A Story That Failed To Bloom

written by Ardis

“Grateful for this opportunity to create a new society in full harmony with nature, we enter into this covenant, promising one another our mutual trust and support. We will face hardship, danger, and potential failure, but we can aspire to the use of practical wisdom to seek joy, love, beauty, community, and life.”

Sue Burke’s Semiosis tells the story of a group of colonists, departed from Earth and dedicated to peace above all else, as they survive on a foreign planet generation by generation. As the back cover promises, their survival will hinge on a bizarre alliance – with a new kind of sentient life.

While the premise is excitingly promising, I’m afraid that, as far as I could tell, it never quite managed to deliver on that promise.

The whole “sentient alien plant” concept intrigued me from the moment I first heard of it, and I wondered more than once (in the four months between when I pre-ordered the book and when I was finally able to read it) just how Burke would present not just a non-human sentience but one that was truly alien. In this, I think, Burke did a wonderful job.

Where I think Semiosis fails to fulfill its potential is in the peculiar structure Burke chose to portray her narrative, as it progressed through the generations. Each chapter is told from one character’s perspective, one character per generation. While this is a fine way to approach storytelling, and served the story well structurally, Burke chose vastly differing voices for each of her characters. I found the switch from voice to voice jarring to the point of disorientation.

It took me until the third chapter to decide that the incongruity in the voice was intentional characterization instead of clumsy writing, and by that time Burke had already lost me. I think, had I been prepared for this narrative quirk from the onset, I would have had a better chance at enjoying the book.

The thing is, I really want to write this up as a fascinating and well-executed technique. Each chapter is written from a different character’s point of view – one per generation (or near enough). Not only are all people different, these people are changing (socially, culturally as well as biologically) in response to the challenges they face and the requirements of their environment. That Burke convincingly represents the POV of multiple very different people in order to assemble her IS an admirable accomplishment. I can’t tell you why it hurt the narrative instead of helping.

That’s hardly the book’s only issue, however. Notably, Semiosis falls victim to what you might call the “Prometheus problem”. Particularly in the first two generations, the decisions of these premier scientists can be downright baffling. Time after time they make terrible calls – beginning before they even leave Earth. For scientists that are supposed to be incredibly smart and thoroughly prepared, it was their repeated failures to think critically or act reasonably (within the bounds of Burke’s established universe) that almost demolished my ability to buy in.

I will say that once I powered through those first few generations, I began to notice some wonderful techniques. Burke pays particular attention to the cultural relationships between generations, knitting them together through graceful and delicate touches. Seemingly small events or symbols from one chapter appear in another as tradition, fable, or law.

Additionally, the colonists’ dedication to “peace,” even generations after the opposite was anything other than an academic concept, is explored and even employed to great effect throughout the book. Themes of identity, intergenerational communication, and the struggle one generation faces as it tries to pass both its knowledge and its priorities on to the next all feature prominently and are well explored within these pages.

All-in-all, I expect Semiosis to pop up on many readers’ “Best Of …” lists, and I absolutely see why. I’m very glad I read it, but a part of me will always yearn for the story I imagined Semiosis would be.

May 29, 2018 1 comment