After the travails of September, October has been a bit surreal: all work, my first trip to Dublin, home for a lesson in butchery (that’s not a metaphor), and a lot more work. I’m back in the US for a couple of weeks, learning that yes, Hallowe’en makes me really uncomfortable… and getting really excited for SciFi Month starting tomorrow!
Reading Round-up
I’ve got back to my usual reading this month (yes, can you tell I got on to the SciFi train early? I have no regrets). While I struggled to settle with a few things (jetlag and migraine aren’t easy to please), it’s been a strong month overall. Reviews may be substituted by mostly vowels…
- The Hanging Tree – Ben Aaronovitch
– OOOOOH - Shadowblack – Sebastien de Castell
- The Collapsing Empire – John Scalzi
- Nemesis Games – James S A Corey
- Tarnished City – Vic James
- Revenger – Alastair Reynolds – EEEEEE
- Artemis – Andy Weir [DNF]
Review Round-up
- Within the Sanctuary of Wings – Marie Brennan
- Tremontaine Season 3: Ambition | The Siege of Riverside | The Bridge
Stacking the shelves
I’ve given up exercising self-restraint in favour of being wildly excited about books.
Conscious demographics
My annual challenge is to read diversely and to love every book. This year I’ve made things a bit more complicated with subsidiary challenges and more fun with the Game of Books.
- 27 male (42%) / 33 female (52%) / 2 trans, non-binary or genderfluid (3%) + 2 anthos
- 9 (14%) – by authors of colour / 35 (55%) prominently featuring POC
- 5 (8%) – by LGBTQIA authors / 24 (38%) featuring LGBTQIA characters
Challenges
Challenges? Pffft. More like guidelines anyway
- 64 / 45 books or novellas (excl. Tremontaine)
- 9 / 10 books by authors of colour
- 5 / 10 non-SFF books of which 0 non-fiction
- 2 / 10 classic SFF books (6 incl. rereads)
- 18 / 30 – off the shelf (it doesn’t count if I bought them to read them straight away!)
- Game of Books score: 329 / 400
