Emma Goto

I really struggled to get into this one. I found the story quite hard to follow, because of how many different characters get introduced throughout the book. It's a pity because there's a lot of cool sci-fi concepts here (i.e. uploading your brain to another body). Also this guy is horny AF, there is random unnecessary sex everywhere (aren't you a trained soldier, just do your job!) and sometimes it just doesn't make sense when the woman jumps on him like it's very male fantasy. So if you're a dude and you're into sex and violence this may be the sci-fi novel for you.

Really in-depth, the author did his research.

I give this one a 3.5/5 because while it wasn't necessarily terrible, I wouldn't recommend anyone else to read it.

It tries to sort of explore the morality of self-driving cars (and who should die in case of an accident) but it felt fairly shallow. The main character gives fairly obvious arguments against the “evil” people who want autonomous cars to take over the road. I think at times the dialogue wasn't that great. The cringiest moment for me was when a social media expert walks into a courtroom and says:

“Nobody knows more about mass communication that I do. I know my machine learning from my micromoments; my conversions from my clickbait; my organic reach from my omni-channels and my big data from my business intelligence...” (He keeps going too!)

Like, who talks like that? Maybe it was on purpose to highlight how silly his character is but it just made me cringe, really.

About a guy who ends up in a gay relationship while cheating on his girlfriend. Kind of melancholy (tbh really melancholy) but good at the same time?

Beautiful, drug-addicted singer Daisy and the band The Six come together to write an album in the 70s. The entire book is told in an interview format, which I think works really well, since it lets the different characters give their own (slightly different) perspectives on certain events.

The author tried to incorporate some sort of twist to the ending but it wasn't a particularly revelatory or “wow” moment for me. Nonetheless, Taylor Jenkins Reid has once again done a really good job with writing out a cast of believable, very human characters.

Tragic that the author wasn't alive to see the killer found. Wish the book could've included more info about the killer and how he was linked to Michelle's theories.

Jo, a woman doing birds nest research in rural America meets girl who claims to be an alien sent down to witness 5 “miracles” before she returns home to her planet. She ends up co-parenting this child with neighbour Gabe, as they debate whether they should hand over the child to police.

Jo and Gabe both have a lot of backstory (illnesses, a tragic past) but it's presented to the reader through the two characters basically word vomiting this out to each other. I felt like the author was trying to give flavor to these two characters but it didn't quite land right.

Jo and Gabe's romance feels very rushed, and Jo comes across as very pushy towards Gabe and it's like she just magically cures him of his mental illnesses.Also it's actually quite creepy how Jo and Ursa are so obsessively attached at the end. Jo kinda goes nuts, surely that sort of erratic behaviour wouldn't make a good candidate for foster parent? That problem isn't really addressed and it all ends happily every after. I will admit I actually thought the girl was an alien until it was revealed at the end that she was not. Looking back, how can a 9 yr old pull off the deception that well??

A really nice sequel to my favourite sci-fi book, Children of Time. This time around it's not spiders, but octopuses! I did find myself getting a bit lost towards the end (probably doesn't help that I didn't binge it and read it over a couple of weeks). The wow factor wasn't quite as there versus the first book, hence the 4 star rating.

A solid fantasy book. Story follows the queen and her handmaiden (secretly a trained killer) in the west where dragons are hated, and a girl aspiring to become a dragon rider in the east, where dragons are revered.

I'm a big fan of dragons but unfortunately the dragons in this book are more in the background when compared to the people (who are all well-written). It's also interesting (and nice) to see that society is fairly egalitarian, where queens are fit to rule on their own, and firstborn children are the heirs to their family regardless of gender.

Alicia murders her husband, and then stops talking. Theo starts a job as her therapist at the hospital where she is held. Determined to get Alice to crack, he plays detective and starts asking around for clues, which is a pretty weird thing for a therapist to do. But the twist at the end was pretty good.

The Raven Tower tells the story of a god who lives in a rock. These small gods take the forms of forests, animals and other entities and are sustained by the prayers and offerings from people.

This particular god narrates its own story, as well as the story of Eolo, who visits the town of Vastai, where the Raven god lives. It's an interesting concept but also a bit tiring to read because the rock god narrates it as though it is talking to Eolo with a lot of “you did this, you did that”.

While it is quite unique, for that reason I will give it a 4/5 since it did make it feel like it was dragging a bit at times.

Not quite 4 stars but closer to 4 than a 3 - the main character felt a bit cliche (sad backstory but they're an emotionally hardened badass now) and I didn't really enjoy the writing style, especially at the start.

Listened to the audiobook narrated by Michelle - definitely recommend!

Learnt a lot of things I didn't know about the Obamas. Feels super relevant as we come into the 2020 elections.

Basically everything I wanted to say I covered in my review of the first book in the series (since I read them back to back). Comfy fantasy, action, a bit of romance, what more could you want!

Set in a land where there's devastating earthquakes and societies either try and survive through the aftermath or end up dying out. There's magic users (Orogenes), who have the power to prevent these earthquakes and wield its power (as well as the life force of other people / nature). Even though they alone can keep the world from falling apart, untrained Orogenes can be a risk to society, and so they're considered to be less than human and are kept under the control of Guardians who will eliminate anyone that steps out of line.

It's a good fantasy book, but it's not a fun fantasy book.

The Orogenes are required to have sex with other Orogenes to produce babies, they lobotomise Orogenes that are too old to be trained and then use their natural instincts to subdue earthquakes, the book begins with a small Orogene child having her hand broken so that she is taught a lesson by her Guardian.

I liked the way the author brought together the storyline of three separate Orogenes - one just embarking on her training, another much further along, and a third woman who living a peaceful life, hiding her powers. I found it really engrossing and hard to put down. So for that I give this one a 5, but I also find it pretty depressing and so I won't be reading the next two books in the trilogy

It's insane the amount of fraud that Theranos managed to pull off. Pretty compelling read.

I love a good sci-fi novel!! The main character Mahit becomes the new ambassador for her small mining station and gets to fulfill her childhood dream of visiting the Empire. Of course there's one small problem in that her predecessor died under mysterious circumstances and a bunch of politics ensue.

Even though the Empire is this overwhelming force that could at any time annex her home, I likex how it wasn't just Empire = bad and Mahit's station = good. Mahit grew up enjoying a lot of the empire's cultural exports e.g. poetry and gets to know some of its people as well through her work as an ambassador.

The other cool part about this book is the maintaining of heritage through copies of people's consciousnesss. Essentially you have a copy of the mind of your predecessor living in you, so that with each successive generation the knowledge can continue to grow and be passed down. I would love to see this concept explored more in future books.

A pandemic kills off 99% of the world's population - an intense book to read during these COVID-19 times.

Instead of focusing on the immediate survival of humans, the book takes a longer term look at how humans try and find purpose and meaning in this new post-apocalyptic world.

Listened to the audiobook version, well narrated.

A very “Aussie” coming-of-age story, set in 1980s Brisbane, filled with a bunch of colourful characters - Vietnamese drug dealers, a bikie gang member, and real-life Slim Halliday (“The Houdini of Boggo Road”) who escaped twice from a Brisbane jail. What makes it all the more amazing is the book is partially based on the author's own childhood (Slim was once his babysitter, and his dad really did spend his days living as a chain-smoking recluse who read books all day).

One of the major themes of the book is what makes someone a "good man". The main character Eli is trying to figure out if he is a good man, as well as if the people around him (who have criminal backgrounds) are also good men. It's interesting that people like convicted felon Slim and bikie gang member Alex are portrayed in that "good man" light even after their past misdeeds, but someone like Teddy is "bad" once their bad deeds are uncovered. Maybe would have been cool to get that redemption, but also highlights Eli's potential naivety / young age throughout most of the book.

Kya, the “marsh girl”, grows up alone in the swamps of North Carolina in the 1950s/60s. Intertwined with her coming-of-age story is the mysterious death of the popular Chase Andrews in 1969. The jumping back between the two storylines really kept me on the edge of my seat, wanting to hear more (I listened to this one as an audiobook).

At times Kya was a bit "woe is me", "nobody loves me" even though she had multiple people around her caring for her by that point - Tate, her brother Jodie, Jumpin' and Mable. A little bit frustrating, but I guess understandable considering her circumstances.I liked the twists - Tate being taken away by the sheriffs, and then the final twist right at the end.In terms of the murder itself, I'm not sure that if it turned out that Kya was smart enough to kill someone, not leave fingerprints or any sort of evidence, and wear convincing disguises as she got on and off the bus in the middle of the night, would have just left that hat in her closet?

Multi-POV book following the stories of Native Americans, some struggling with their identity of what it means to be a Native American, as they come together for a powwow in Oakland. I found it a bit hard at times to keep up with the different characters and how they are all connected to each other. Perhaps it would have been better as a longer book, or with less characters, but nonetheless pretty solid.

The plot follows a couple of criminals plus a monk who hates women, plus a 3ft tall badger-person (who is honestly so cute) as they go on a suicide mission.

T Kingfisher just writes really comfy fantasy with a dash of romance (usually with proper adults with issues instead of your more typical teen fantasy romance) and this was definitely more of the same but a good one!

It felt really hard to rate this one on its own, because it honestly felt like half a book with the way it ended on a cliffhanger. But it was compelling enough that I read the sequel back to back. Combined the two of them are 5 stars!!

3.5 stars. I read it one sitting so it wasn't completely bad, but I wasn't convinced by the romance subplot, I don't think the main character had enough going for her that a god would fall in love with her? I also didn't really connect with most of the characters because we didn't really get a chance to know them, only on a surface level.

A quick, fun sci-fi read with a unique concept (people over 75 choosing to become soldiers). The dialogue felt a bit wooden which made it harder to feel any attachment to the characters, and there's the cliche of the seemingly ordinary main character being really good at everything he does which comes across as forced and unrealistic.

The main character was veeeeery quirky and I couldn't really deal tbh.