Elizabeth

A comprehensive and thoroughly readable account of the attack on the Templars by Philip IV of France, the possible and probably underlying motivations, examination and analysis of the trials in France, England, Aragon, Castile and Cyprus, and concluding with a discussion of the historiography surrounding the subject.

Earns its reputation as the most thorough account of the Templar trials.

Historical fantasy set in Prague? Shut up and take my money.

The blurb says Witcher cross VE Schwab fans, but I'm not sold on that. Witcher, because of the Eastern European setting/names for demons. VE Schwab - I'm guessing is for A Darker Shade of Magic, but I got more Rivers of London vibes (without the humour).

This is an urban fantasy set in 1868 Prague. Our hero Domek is a lamplighter, but lamplighters protect the night streets from demons - mainly pijavice (literally translated as leech, they're vampires). In a normal work shift, Domek stumbles across The Mystery. Of course, our heroine (and love interest) is a pijavica, and also stumbles across The Mystery. If you've ever read a book, I think you can see where the story is going. Just like a good, cosy detective story, all loose ends are tidy and every one (who survives) gets a happily ever after (for now).

Anyway: an enjoyable read, a great debut, a love letter to Prague, and a standalone historical urban fantasy. 

Reading this book highlighted just how good the television series was - I already knew most of the stories. The charaterisation of Sister Evangeline didn't sit well with me, it seemed that the author went out of her way to uncharitably point out the humourless, damp, uneducated side of her, with no real insight into the person she really was (although as she pointed out, Sister Evangaline didn't have the time of day for her, so it's possible she never discovered who the Sister really was.)

Charlotte-Rose Millar has done an outstanding job here of reminding us that diabolism and emotions are integral to early modern English witchcraft beliefs, the lack of which in previous scholarship is highlighted by this excellent work. By using so-far understudied witchcraft pamphlet literature as her core sources for discussion, Millar ably demonstrates the importance of emotion in popular conceptions and perceptions of witchcraft, highlighting not only the evolution of witch beliefs over the early modern period, but also the continuity of beliefs over that same period, indicating that pamphleteers and the reading public had a fairly stable and specific idea of what a witch was and what witchcraft entailed.

A very cogent and sensible argument in a very readable monograph. I very much enjoyed this one.

So.. I didn't hate this one. But I didn't love it. Everything that made [b:The Bear and the Nightingale 25489134 The Bear and the Nightingale (Winternight Trilogy, #1) Katherine Arden https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1470731420s/25489134.jpg 45268929] amazing for me was stripped out of the second in the trilogy. Which doesn't meant to say Vasya's story doesn't follow the natural progression, in the way that fairy tales do, but there was not enough of my particular boat-floating, and I probably won't be picking up the final (although, if it goes where I think it will/should, it will be a great finish to Vasya's character arc).Katherine Arden does provide a reading list for Medieval Russia at the end, though, which has definitely been added to my wishlist.

A flawed investigation into Scot's [b:The Discoverie of Witchcraft 590977 The Discoverie of Witchcraft Reginald Scot https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1388197337s/590977.jpg 577733], but also a good starting point for the reader to begin their own research into Scot.

Although this is marketed as an ‘introductory textbook', the lack of citations really annoyed me - it explicitly states that the emphasis is on secondary sources, and even then only a few are made mention of. This made the book good for night-time reading, taking a wide-but-brief look at everything, but I certainly wouldn't recommend it to students looking to start out reading in this area. Pick something a bit more meaty.

This is a beautiful coffee table book. The essays are short (10-minute) reads, delving into how to investigate an unreadable medieval manuscript. The background on Voynich was new, and therefore particularly interesting, to me. All in all, I do recommend having a flick through this if you come across it.

If you're interested in medieval manuscripts (as a student or layperson), I definitely recommend picking this up and having a proper look. The reproduction of the MS is amazingly detailed, and is an excellent example of what a MS looks like, for those not fortunate enough to get near one in the flesh (pun completely unintended but I am still proud of it), especially if you've done some research into codicology and would like to see it in action.

Heavy on the purple prose and hyperbole, but light on the details. The details thing is to be expected in book covering a thousand years or so. The love-letter to Richard I of England was pretty spectacular, though. You could do worse for Baby's First Crusade Overview.

Zero excuses for the lack of referencing, though, even on directly quoted material. Be an academic textbook, or be a short introduction. Don't try and fail at both.

An in-depth but readable look at how the (1215) Magna Carta came to be, and how the provisions in the charter affected different members of Angevin society. I only briefly skimmed the chapters on later reissues and later interpretations and effects of the charter, since it's not relevant to my research interests.

I felt very clever at picking up on the thread here of finding home as an adult, of returning ‘home' (even if when that home is a place that no longer exists) and creating ‘home'. Of taking events that happen to you when you're young and letting them be part of you, but not all of you. Of the consequences of surviving. And then Kay explains all this in the afterword, and I felt less insightful.

All the Seas picks up four years after A Brightness Long Ago, whose main thread is an event that happened in the past and how that shaped the narrator of that story. That narrator is in this tale too, as well as many people you've already met from Brightness and also Children of Earth and Sky, set twenty years after All the Seas. They wind together, as you'd expect from Kay.

I don't know that this is as strong as others I've read by Kay, but is that just because it's my first reading? I find they need at least a re-read to solidify what they have to share with me. It's absolutely solid Kay, in that you're getting a large cast, a sweeping tale, events that change lives in unexpected ways, and of course no neat ending. It'll stand alone, but I think you'll get more out of it having read Brightness first.

I really enjoyed Kira's story, but the Shargh bores me to tears. Chief sees girl he wants to marry. Chief marries girl. Chief knocks up girl. Boooooring. This would be an awesome book if it just followed Kira and her encounters with the Shargh from her perspective. Also, if Kest was so mad about her why didn't he go with her? Although the fact that he didn't was a nice departure from 'boy must save girl' tropes. I liked it enough to start the second book.

Obviously I put this on hold at my library because of the controversy surrounding Pascoe earlier this year and the general culture wars over this book since its release. I listened to the audio version, so I can't evaluate things like if it has citations, or the quality of Pascoe's sources.

I had no issue with the book itself, although it greatly annoyed me when Pascoe used the same word twice in a sentence (I can't think of any without the text to refer to, but sentences like “the area was peopled with people from...”). He did stray into romanticising the Indigenous ‘way of life' towards the end.

Overall, it doesn't suck. I can't see anything controversial in here. Pascoe continually highlights that more research into Australia's Indigenous history needs to be funded and he is not wrong.

However, I can absolutely urge authors to put aside some money and pay a professional to narrate their monograph, if they aren't practised performers.

I can't believe I didn't find this as a young adult obsessed with dystopias, but in 1993 YA wasn't a genre and this certainly wasn't marketed at me. It didn't hit as hard as I expected, and I think that's a combination of growing up on this type of story (if you read Australian YA in the 90s, you know), but also, it's...happening. It's entirely conceivable. It could be inevitable. The story starts in 2024, and that's eighteen months from when I first read it. Maybe that's the scary part for readers.

The parts I found more interesting to sink my brain-teeth into were Lauren-as-Prophet. Lauren tells the story through journal entries and extracts from the religious text she's building around her created religion, Earthseed. Both Lauren and Butler are former Baptists, and the exploration of an (intentionally) simplistic reaction and adaptation of Christianity into something that meets Lauren's needs and hopes. The goal of Earthseed is to fulfill the destiny of leaving Earth and heading for the stars; reflecting Laurens goal of abandoning her community - she believes both community and Earth itself can't be sustained in the long-term.

Mostly, I enjoyed the journeys - the physical journey Lauren takes, the followers she collects along the way, the character growth and revelation. Like most dystopia, Lauren keeps her hope in a time of despair and becomes a leader because of it. 

Butler noped out of completing the intended series of Earthseed, because it was too depressing to research and write, but the sequel, Parable of the Talents, is on my TBR.

Interesting, but far too short to provide anything in-depth on any of the religions covered. It's intended as a university-level textbook and I think it does a good job in that respect, although it does demand a certain base-level of knowledge on each of the religions discussed. Due to the authors (and probably the scope of the project), much of the discussion is broad, generic, and in modern religion especially it is limited to North America.

My notes read: “P&P&Dragons!”, but really this is the Jane Austin-esque mannerpunk of [b:Sense and Sensibility 14935 Sense and Sensibility Jane Austen https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1397245675l/14935.SY75.jpg 2809709] rather than [b:Pride and Prejudice 1885 Pride and Prejudice Jane Austen https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1320399351l/1885.SY75.jpg 3060926]. And the time is deliciously Victorian than Regency. And, of course, the ladies to be married off are dragons.That aside, this is a lovely book. I loved the intricate dragon society – as much if not more intricate than the actual upper-class English society that actually existed – and the utter unconcern with death that forms part of it. Victorian death culture is fascinating, and in dragon society where it's expected you will eat your elders (and your weakling young), death is treated in a way that extends the Victorian fascination and acceptance of it. (I recently published a paper on death culture so it particularly stands out for me).Walton gently and lovingly pokes fun at Austin in a way that will amuse Austin readers. The chapter titles count the number of proposals, confessions, and deaths. I listened to the audio version so I can't exactly recall the titles but they were along the lines of A Second Proposal or A Fourth Proposal and a Second Confession, or A Second Deathbed. Finally, the narrator confesses they have lost the count, which was perhaps the most amusing part of the story.The young sisters to be married off (and you know they will be married off, that's how it works) have perhaps the least agency in the book, but I forgive their wallflowerness simply because it is in the style of Austin. I probably shouldn't, because I don't forgive other fantasy books the things that annoy me simply because “that's what actually happened” in the time period in which they are based, but, eh.Also, because I am into that sort of thing, the side-story of underground heresy was particularly of interest to me, although if you have no interest in Church and Reformation history it won't make any difference to your appreciation of the story.If you're into mannerpunk and Austin, I completely recommend this.

I'm not an Emelan fan, I like Tortall a lot better. In saying that, my favourite characters in Emelan are Rosethorn and Briar both of whom are main characters here, along with Evvy (who Briar picked up in Street Magic). This is essentially the backstory to Briar's behaviour in The Will of the Empress, and we learn how Evvy met Luvo (who was a major character in Melting Stones, although Battle Magic is a far more interesting read than either of those two stories.

The POV switches a lot, which I guess is fashionable in fantasy these days and is necessary for some parts of the storytelling, but it is jarring when it happens multiple times in a chapter. It also loses some dramatic tension when one of the characters is thought to be dead, but the reader knows they are not because of the POV switching. The reunion of the characters with the person they thought had died loses much of the feels it could have had.

I wanted to give this an ‘It was ok' star rating, but I think it deserves more than two. Overall, it is still Tamora Pierce and her fantastic style. I don't want to make it sound awful but I'm not a fan of the setting and I didn't really care about the war these people were fighting in. Like the rest of Emelan it won't be in my re-read pile, but if you're an Emelan fan you'll probably enjoy this one a lot more than the last one.

No ground-breaking revelations for someone who follows [a:Amanda Palmer 1010543 Amanda Palmer https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1297527121p2/1010543.jpg] around the internet, but a lovely chatty-style book. Very readable, enjoyable, and frank, with a few tears thrown in because of reasons.

Despite the intimidating page count, this is a fantastic introduction to the whole history of Christianity. It begins well before Jesus, placing the formation of Christianity into its broader world context, and continues right up to Benedict XVI.

For such a huge undertaking the book is thoroughly researched (and referenced!), easy to read, and wryly humorous. It is entirely non-judgemental on what we might now today call mistakes made by the Church (by the same token there was no crowing about successes, either), but MacCulloch doesn't shy away from tackling those hard topics with the same even-handedness he shows the whole topic.

For an academic student of the Church, without a religious affiliation, it has been an invaluable addition to my collection and my brain.

I think it's a bit misleading to call this ‘A Steampunk Novel of the Crimean War', given that the ‘war' part only feels like about 5 minutes at the end of the book. It follows the story of 3 (sometimes 4) groups of people who eventually meet up during the war - it is essentially a tale about the the different journeys these people take. It is a fun, silly, steampunk-y book that never really resolves the story of who these people are and what they're doing, but I enjoyed it anyway.

This was a short, easy read that didn't really leave an impact on me. I agree with many of the reviews I've seen that discuss Station Eleven as literary fiction with a SF veneer, and I can see how that view has been reached: the SF is pretty thin on the ground here, the science is less science and more fiction. That's cool, I suspended disbelief and ran with it.

On the literary hand, however, I find it harder to get along. The two major hammers-over-the-head of Station Eleven, the comic within the book, and the Shakespeare, were as subtle as a brick. There was no nuance, no subtlety, no depth to any of the characters.

I do, however, like the world, as unbelievable as it might be (twenty years and no one's rigged up any kind of tech?). I loved the vignette of Jeevan and his brother, and to a lesser extent Clark at the airport and Air Gradia 452 and that's probably the only thing I'll take away from Station Eleven - the stories of people in the immediate aftermath of the pandemic.