Recent reading

[lunabee34]

Ninefox Gambit by Yoon Ha Lee

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I really enjoyed this. Although I do wish I had a better understanding of some of the aspects of the novel's world building, I really appreciate that the novel just drops a reader into the world without explaining exactly what's going on, letting the reader figure out most of the action through context.

I really enjoy the protagonist, Cheris, who is thrust into a fish-out-water situation. I also enjoy Jedao, the protagonist/antagonist, whose horrific actions hundreds of years ago are a mystery that Cheris needs to solve. I get shades of Ian Tregillis in the servitors, a sentient robot class that is largely overlooked by humans and that sticks with humans for its own as yet unstated agenda. I love the beautiful descriptions; gorgeous language abounds.

And Yoon Ha Lee sticks the ending. Wow. Very much ready to see what happens next.




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Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


Well, at least that only took an hour and twenty minutes to read.




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The Medea of Euripides by Gilbert Murray

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


This is not the edition I read, but I did read the translation by Murray with his excellent notes on the text.

I gave this three stars, not because of the quality of the play, but because I can't find any enjoyment in a story about a mother murdering her children. I wouldn't have read the play at all if I didn't have to teach it this semester.

I find Medea sympathetic up to a point. I think Jason treats her poorly, and I think her anger at him is justified. However, I can't sympathize with her murdering her own children, and I also have to wonder about all the horrific deeds she committed in the past. She intimates that she didn't really want to commit them, that she recoiled "in agony" from killing Pelias and her brother, that her extreme love for Jason compelled her to do so. But IDK. Meethinks that when your first recourse to getting out of trouble and redressing wrongs is always violent murder that maybe you are the problem.



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Comments

[lunabee34]

I'm so glad to hear that! Sometimes it can be hard for an author to keep up the momentum of a first book, so I'm glad it lives up to expectations.