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#robots, #series, #fantasyscifi, #fourstarbookreview

#youngadult, #fantasyscifi, #dysfunctionalfamily, #twostarbookreview

Divya is also the author of Machinehood, a book I listed on the Greedy Reading List Six More Fantastic

#fantasyscifi, #oldnewyork, #magic, #historicalfiction, #timetravel, #threestarbookreview

#fantasyscifi, #southern, #booksaboutbooks, #fourstarbookreview

#timetravel, #robots, #epistolary, #fantasyscifi, #LGBTQ

I mentioned Station Eleven in the Greedy Reading List Six Fantastic Dystopian and Postapocalyptic Novels

I'm listening to Funny Story as an audiobook (narrated by the fantastic Julia Whelan) courtesy of Libro.fm

He's a fantastic character I loved. This great book by C.A. also want to read Carey's The Boy on the Bridge, which is a standalone book in the same series, is fantastic

ICYMI: I've been thinking lately about robot books and specifically about this great series by Neuvel, in which a girl stumbles upon pieces of a giant robot and makes solving the mystery her life's work. A girl named Rose in rural South Dakota falls into a hole that has intricate carvings covering the walls, and she wakes up in the palm of an enormous robot hand. Where did it come from? What do the carvings mean? What is the purpose of any of this? Years later Rose is a world-renowned physicist working to unlock the secrets of the hand and the curious artifacts she stumbled across as a child, but the mysteries persist. The Sleeping Giants story is shown through interviews and journal entries. The interview structure keeps the characters at somewhat of a distance from the reader, yet Neuvel allows their spoken-only participation in the book to express their growth, hopes, and fears. The characters relate events that have already happened through the lenses of their own points of view, creating the potential for unreliable narrators, characters who are hiding important information, and many resulting twists and turns. Neuvel explores concepts of personal responsibility, how the possibility of life beyond Earth affects everything, and how manipulation and observation--potentially by other beings in the solar system--shape behavior. Also: the ending--! Do you have any Bossy thoughts about this book? Neuvel was reportedly inspired to write this book after his son asked him to build a toy robot and requested a full back story for the creature. The next books in this series are Waking Gods and Only Human, and I liked them both.

in the titles that make up the Greedy Reading Lists Six Royally Magical Young Adult Series and Six Fantastic

I will, after all, happily read stories about talking dragons, or fantastical worlds, or time travel,

Elliott offers a fantastic, boy-crazy, British story about missteps, facing change, accepting the past

This is a fantastic blend of realistic complications, mistakes, adjustments, and spunk. This is a fantastic blend of realistic complications, mistakes, adjustments, and spunk.

, Allison, Nate, Janelle, and David and their dialogue are fantastic as always.

The Autoboyography dialogue is fantastic and witty but feels effortless and like it comes from actual This is fantastic contemporary young adult fiction. I loved this fantastic memoir! Wood's memoir is heartwarming and funny and tragic and vivid.

The details of princess life, privilege, and pressures are fun and fantastic, including elaborate clothing

That book introduced the fantastic best-friend character of Felicity "Fizzy" Chen, and The True Love

McManus offers a little of everything in a fantastic mix of teamwork, a health scare, sibling tensions

Jackson's sequel to the young adult mystery The Good Girl's Guide to Murder, which again features the fantastic answers but many fascinating gray areas to consider. 03 Good Girl, Bad Blood by Holly Jackson Yay, the fantastic

The women's lifelong friendship felt like the heart of the story and was a fantastic element. The women's lifelong friendship felt like the heart of the story and was a fantastic element.

Each life Nora tries on changes her in some way, whether by erasing her regrets about a path not taken, showing her that she's capable of bravery and discovery or commitment, or by emphasizing that the flip side of joy in any life will always be sadness. Humans are fundamentally limited, generalising creatures, living on auto-pilot, who straighten out curved streets in their minds, which explains why they get lost all the time. Nora Seed feels like she can't go on. Life is too much, there's no hope for anything better, and her future contains nothing more for her. Her despair leads her to try to end her life. But she finds herself transported to an in-between state that is not life and not death, in the form of a library that exists outside of time and holds shelves full of the "books" of all of her possible lives, from that frozen moment (midnight) forward. Each possibility of a present and future is built upon different combinations of decisions Nora could have made in her life in the past. Some lives are notable, others comfortable, and still others are full of pain. "The thing you have to remember is that this is an opportunity and it is rare and we can undo any mistake we made, live any life we want. Any life. Dream big... You can be anything you want to be. Because in one life, you are." A trusted figure from her childhood serves as her guide to the library, advising her to review her Book of Regrets and plunge into alternate lives to see if a different set of circumstances might fit--and might save Nora from ending it all. There's a lot to unpack from within Haig's fascinating premise. He explores shifting realities and asks how much of a person's happiness and life course is determined by circumstance, by choice, and by chance--as well as how much of what makes someone who they are is inherent and how much is shaped by the web of decisions that make up a life. Maybe there was no perfect life for her, but somewhere, surely, there was a life worth living. Nora dips in and out of different lives, trying on careers, love lives, travel adventures, fame and fortune, and a settled family life. But not having experienced and remembered each moment that led to her various life options--which she joins in medias res-- keeps Nora at a distance from them. Her mind begins to fill in gaps to help her exist in that life, or to help her find her way around a new town, or to understand how she ended up where she finds herself, yet she's altogether missed her own decision-making, private jokes, clarifying moments, sadness, and joys that made her that person in that life with those people on that path. She enters each journey in progress, leaping into an existence without having built any of it, and she revels in the possibilities while also feeling empty because she didn't lay the foundation. “The trouble was that eventually Nora began to lose any sense of who she was. Like a whispered word passed around from ear to ear, even her name began to sound like just a noise, signifying nothing.” Yet each life Nora tries on changes her in some way, whether by erasing her regrets about a path not taken, showing her that she's capable of bravery and discovery or commitment, or by emphasizing the ups and downs of any life--in one life she might have an exciting career, but she may have devastatingly lost a loved one. She may find a path in a cozy life, but without a deep romantic love. Her rock-star self may seem impressive, but that Nora also seems despondent. Nora begins to understand that none of these situations is perfect, and that the flip side of joy for anyone in any life will always be sadness. It may very well feel like oversimplifying for those familiar with mental illness to watch the character of Nora, who in her original life is experiencing crushing emotional turmoil, be able to "learn" herself out of despair. But I was taken by her journey of discovery leading to the realization that sad times make joyful moments all the sweeter. I also particularly enjoyed Haig's exploration into the impacts Nora had on those around her--who was alive and thriving in certain life threads because of Nora's care or attention, and who was missing from another life thread, seemingly because she hadn't taken time with them. No pressure, Nora, but everyone is depending on you! Haig presents a captivating hook, and I enjoyed his storytelling. The setup keeps Nora at a distance from her possible lives and thereby keeps the reader at a distance from Nora. This meant that I didn't feel emotionally invested in Nora's story although I appreciated the implications of her experiences and was very interested in what would happen. The ending isn't unexpected, but it does feel hard-fought and satisfying. Do you have any Bossy thoughts about this book? Haig is also the author of How to Stop Time, his memoir Reasons to Stay Alive, and other books. I read The Midnight Library at the same time my mom did; as part of an online book club for March; and in preparation for my in-person book club. Trifecta! If you like books that play with time and alternate realities, you might also like the books on the Greedy Reading List Six Riveting Time-Travel Escapes. I mentioned this book (along with Two White Queens and the One-Eyed Jack and The Arsonists' City) in Three Books I'm Reading Now, 3/3/21 Edition.

extended family--including a stolid patriarch and matriarch, a free-spirited daughter, a spunky and fantastic Cosby This is a fantastic blend of realistic complications, mistakes, adjustments, and spunk.

01 Machinehood by S.B. Divya In her debut novel, Divya offers a society set in 2095. Humanity is reliant on homemade and commercially manufactured pills--for health, for work focus, for managing bots, for healing, for sleep, and for transitioning between all of the above. Using pills is the only way humans can compete with artificial intelligence in the gig economy. Welga Ramirez is an elite bodyguard, former special forces, and on the verge of retirement. Like everyone, Welga has constant feeds allowing anyone who's interested to see what she's doing. She keeps her virtual tip jar up, and her biggest challenge lately has been shifting her angle or slightly manipulating a situation during her bodyguard jobs in order to maximize tips. Then the unthinkable happens: her team's client is murdered. Violent crimes really don't happen anymore, and society is thrown into a tailspin. A new terrorist group, The Machinehood, takes responsibility. They're attacking and killing major pill funders, and they threaten more widespread destruction if society doesn't immediately stop using pills as the basis for everyday tasks and as the foundation for the worldwide economy. In the midst of a global panic, Welga is drawn back into intelligence work in order to identify and fight this new enemy--an enemy that may turn out to be a new incarnation of an old nemesis. This book will be published March 2, 2021. I received a prepublication copy of this book courtesy of Gallery Books and NetGalley. 02 We Begin at the End by Chris Whitaker Walk is the chief of police in the small coastal California town where he grew up. He made the heartbreaking decision decades earlier to tell the truth and send his best friend Vincent to prison, and now Vincent is about to be released. Duchess is a thirteen-year-old girl trying to keep her family together. Her mother Star is old friends with Walk and Vincent, and when Vincent reappears, he disrupts the tenuous peace and calm that Duchess and her steady family friend Walk have been able to secure. Can Walk and Duchess--an unlikely pair on the surface, but both used to disappointment and relying on themselves--somehow prevent Vincent and Star from destroying themselves and everyone and everything around them? I received a prepublication copy of this book, scheduled for publication March 2, 2021, courtesy of Henry Holt & Co. and NetGalley. 03 The Arctic Fury by Greer Macallister It's 1853, and longtime California trail guide Virginia Reeve is offered the opportunity to take charge of an unlikely expedition. A benefactor wants her to lead a team of twelve women into the Arctic to locate the missing Franklin Expedition. Each of the women brings unique skills and strengths to the team, but each also holds secrets of her own. In timelines alternating between the expedition and the events of a year and a half afterward, Macallister pieces together what really happened to the brave, motley crew of women out on the wild, dangerous ice. If you like books with wintry settings, you might also like the books on the Greedy Reading List Six Books with Cold, Wintry Settings to Read by the Fire. What are you reading these days? This mix is working well for me: science fiction with themes about society's reliance on attention and outside stimulation; a gritty modern-day, small-town mystery with beautifully imperfect characters bringing it all to life; and a woman-powered historical fiction story of an expedition to the coldest of destinations, the Arctic. Which books are you reading and enjoying these days, bookworms?

The unlikely Jaryk-Lucy connection captured my heart, the Misha-Jaryk friendship was fantastic, and Chakrabarti's

Johansen offers peeks at her characters' pasts as well as the forces that shaped the Tearling, and she plays with time and reality to create an ending to the trilogy that I didn't anticipate. The Fate of the Tearling is the final book in Erika Johansen's Queen of the Tearling trilogy. The first two are The Queen of the Tearling and The Invasion of the Tearling, and there's a recently published prequel, Beneath the Keep. In current-day Tearling society there's oppressive wretchedness (human trafficking, child sex slaves, and a literal underground warren of nefarious activity, “the Crèche”). In the timeline set farthest in the past, we see a faulted but idealistic society built around William Tear’s vision that everyone is special in their own way but equal in importance. But while William Tear inspired a (fragile) cult of personality, his heir and son Jonathan is no politician--he's not a gifted public speaker, more of an introvert, thinker, and philosopher who doesn't care to endear himself to the public. Visions and magically determined predictions guide decision-making for both leaders and their guides. Meanwhile the Orphan, a grave-robbing monster making zombies of children, lurks in the night, threatening the stability of the hard-fought status quo of the Tearling and placing every citizen's safety in danger. I very much enjoyed harking back to the childhoods of the Fetch, Row Finn, and Jonathan Tear to better understand their motivations and the experiences that shaped them. The elaborate escape plans and rescue plots in the book were one of my favorite elements. I also loved seeing two strong, clever, diametrically opposed queens savvily playing with the lines of trust and manipulation. The nemeses come to understand each other more deeply in an unlikely situation, and it was an evolution I found fascinating. “Empathy. Carlin always said it was the great value of fiction, to put us inside the minds of strangers.” Christianity is presented as a swift, sweeping, destructive force in the Town without offering any redemption or morality to its followers, who are essentially presented as simple-minded. I was frustrated by the determinedly held secrets of the Crossing that prevented younger generations from learning helpful lessons from history and understanding their ancestors' mistakes and successes. Johansen plays with timelines and offers a shifting reality at the end that I didn't at all anticipate. I have mixed emotions about this ending for the story--it felt a little anticlimactic in its "undoing" of prior events and was an enormous departure from the tone and feel of the rest of Johansen's trilogy. I already miss my favorite characters from the series. Do you have any Bossy thoughts about this book? I mentioned this book in my review for the trilogy's prequel, Beneath the Keep. It turned out to be really helpful for me to read this ending to the trilogy before delving into the prequel because I'd read the others in the series a while ago. The Fate of the Tearling also appeared (along with The Girl from Widow Hills by Megan Miranda and I Was Told It Would Get Easier by Abbi Waxman) in the Greedy Reading List Three Books I'm Reading Now, 2/17/21 Edition.

I loved this. Romy's soaring hopes, her vulnerability and then her growing doubts, her self-reliance and quick thinking, and the shifts and twists of the book all kept me hooked for this quick read. Can you fall in love with someone you’ve never met, never even spoken to--someone who is light years away? This young adult science fiction story has an irresistible premise: teenaged Romy is the sole survivor on her spaceship, which is en route to establishing an outpost on a new planet. She's on her own out there in space, and as lonely as any human could imagine being. There's no hope of seeing another human again anytime soon. Her sole communication outlet is with her NASA contact, Molly, who sends her audio messages (and occasionally forwards along episodes of Romy's favorite TV show). But then Romy gets word that another ship has launched from earth, with a young man called J as the pilot. While events on Earth spiral into world war and destruction, sending the space missions toward uncertain futures, Romy and J make contact. They message each other, share their hopes and fears, and quickly grow to rely on each other--the only two humans in the universe experiencing their unusual set of circumstances. They begin to forge a bond Romy never would have anticipated. But the odd messages she begins receiving from Earth (and from J himself) begin to throw everything she knows about J--her only link to humanity--into doubt. I loved this. Romy is on her own in space, haunted by the events that led to her solo venture. Her soaring hopes of human contact, her vulnerability and romanticized ideas--and then her growing doubts--her self-reliance, quick thinking, and strength of character, and the shifts and twists of the book all kept me hooked. Do you have any Bossy thoughts about this book? James is also the author of The Quiet at the End of the World, The Next Together and its sequel The Last Beginning, The Starlight Watchmaker, and other books. I haven't read any of these others yet. I first mentioned The Loneliest Girl in the Universe (along with The Unwilling by John Hart and Beneath the Keep by Erika Johansen) in the Greedy Reading List Three Books I'm Reading Now, 1/28/21 Edition.

The book revels in wonderful LGBTQ love and tons of sexiness; fantastic New York-centric details; and

Kate Quinn is the author of the fantastic titles The Diamond Eye, The Huntress, The Rose Code, and The

The kingdom's evils are intensely detailed and extensively explored; this motivates characters to seek change, but also made the book difficult to read. Beneath the Keep, to be published 2/2/21, is a prequel to Erika Johansen's Queen of the Tearling series (three other books are in the series, The Queen of the Tearling, The Invasion of the Tearling, and The Fate of the Tearling). This book traces the history of the Tearling as a kingdom crushed by famine, feudalism, corruption, greed, and unrest--which spurs on some citizens to attempt to shift the kingdom toward becoming a land with strong new hope and opportunity. Meanwhile the fabled True Queen is said to be poised to save them all. Is Princess Elyssa the one they've all been waiting for? Elyssa recalls that the history shared by her tutor Lady Glynn was made up of: "...tales of good, but much more of evil, of humanity‘s vast suffering, of suffering that could have been averted at so many turns if only there had been someone of true heart, of good intent…. If only that person had stepped forward at the right moment…" The Tearling kingdom is (literally) built upon an actual underground warren (the Creche) of tunnels housing a commercial system based on degenerate activity, the opportunity to act upon cruel whims, and insufferably atrocious exchanges of money, drugs, and paid-for rape in various forms. "...Crèche babies, likely sold in their first weeks of life...had each learned the great lesson of the tunnels: in a world where brutality was a constant, it was infinitely better to be the one holding the whip.” Beneath the Keep is absolutely steeped in the darkest imaginable and shockingly widespread depravity: trafficking in children and adults; vulnerable people used as slaves for sex; brutal fighting to the death; and various other horrors. There's extensive page time spent on ghastly monstrousness. Some of the characters I loved from the rest of the series (I'm looking at you, Mace, and also the Fetch--side note, that nickname always reminds me of the very off-topic movie Mean Girls) are star players within this dystopian period of Johansen's Tearling world. Childhood bonds and shared difficulties are heavily featured and are shown to be enormously important to shaping the book's characters and their life paths (for example, Christian and Maura; Brenna and Arlen; Aislynn and Liam); these bonds are similarly key in the final book of the series, The Fate of the Tearling (in that case, with Katie and Row and Katie and Jonathan). Another common theme between this prequel and the final book in the trilogy is the widespread suffering (and significant effect on the plot) caused by the actions of bitter, unacknowledged heirs (Row; Arlen). I loved Aislynn's attempts to achieve upheaval in the wake of her life horrors, and her renewed, fierce desire to seek justice. Yet as in The Fate of the Tearling, populist movements are cruelly crushed, along with hope for a better world for all. Beneath the Keep sets up a scene of sweeping societal despair and its flip side: an opportunity for new beginnings to take place in The Queen of the Tearling. But Beneath the Keep's events are almost universally bleak, with so much lost, so many horrors, so many instances of depravity and pure evil, good generally losing out to bad, and endless terrible impulses wreaking havoc on individuals and on society as a whole. A corrupt church and faulted religion are presented as contributing to broad destruction and greed. Throughout the series there is a dark undercurrent that serves as either a motivator for warped debauchery or as inspiration for change. But in Beneath the Keep the evils are intensely detailed and constantly explored. It was really difficult to read a book with so much page time spent on abuse and violence. Do you have any Bossy thoughts about this book? I first mentioned Beneath the Keep (along with The Loneliest Girl in the Universe and The Unwilling) in the Greedy Reading List Three Books I'm Reading Now, 1/28/21 Edition. I received a prepublication copy of this book courtesy of Dutton Books and NetGalley.

This series invites comparisons to another fantastic Victorian-era-set mystery series featuring a strong

It features the fantastic characters from book one, and the plot picks up with a new version of the fight

#dragons, #fantasyscifi, #threestarbookreview

A book I loved, in case you missed it! Jesuits in space find extraterrestrial life--and explore the limits of their faith. This is unlike anything I've read, and Russell is a master of a guide here. In The Sparrow, humans find proof of extraterrestrial life, and the UN begins deliberating about how best to proceed. Meanwhile a small team from the Society of Jesus quickly strikes out on its own to approach the planet first. The life they find there is wondrous and overwhelming, and it forces them to rethink their assumptions about humanity and the universe. About this book, Russell says, “We seem to believe that if we act in accordance with our understanding of God’s will, we ought to be rewarded. But in doing so we’re making a deal that God didn’t sign on to. “In our world, if people believe at all, they believe that God is love, God is hearts and flowers, and that God will send you theological candy all the time. But if you read Torah, you realize that God has a lot to answer for. God is a complex personality. I wanted to explore that complexity and that moral ambiguity. God gives us rules but those are rules for us, not for God.” This book! This book is about everything. Family, pain, love, music, influence, trust, wonder, brutality, invention, discovery, loyalty, and most of all, faith—in some cases, lost and found again. And also...aliens. I don’t usually read books again, but I could use a copy of my own to highlight upon rereading. It took a little time to get going for me, but then I was blown away. Any Bossy thoughts about this book? Jesuits in space! Russell was turned down 31 times before this book was picked up by an agent. Now it's been in print for 25 years and is beloved by many readers. Have you read this one? Russell has also written Children of God (The Sparrow, #2); the character-driven historical fiction book Doc (about Doc Holliday), which I really liked; and other books set in the American West (such as Epitaph); historical fiction (2019's Women of the Copper Country), and novels relating to faith, such as Thread of Grace. Clearly I need to catch up on more Russell books!

#fantasyscifi, #series, #threestarbookreview

#fantasyscifi, #youngadult, #series, #didnotfinish

Addie grapples with what it means to only be able to whisper in the world rather than shout. What is the value of a life that must be begun anew each day--a life no one else holds memories of? In early eighteenth-century France, 23-year-old Addie LaRue is desperate. She's about to be married off to an older, slightly repulsive widower to serve as a nursemaid for his children, and her parents support this horrifying plan. Addie wants to see more of the world, to be more in the world, and she is eager to allow for some mystery in her life. So she makes a Faustian bargain in order to live freely--until she's ready to surrender her soul. But it's essential to be specific and exacting when making a bargain with the Darkness. She may live for centuries if she wishes, and she will be free of entanglements and obligations--but she will be immediately forgotten by everyone she meets. Each day Addie wakes up a stranger, even to someone she spent the night with. She can't have a home or a job because a landlord or employer would have no recollection of her after a day. She can make no mark on the world--she cannot write or draw, she cannot disturb the snow by walking through it, she cannot even say her true name to another person. But she begins to eke out an existence around the edges of the Darkness's oppressive rules. She can serve as a muse; she can inspire music and art in others; she can learn what others want or need and be that for them for a day. She can borrow, steal, indulge, and then disappear. I found Addie's workarounds to be one of the most fascinating parts of this story. Addie finds the Darkness abhorrent and infuriating, yet he is the only being who recognizes her, who knows her. Over decades and centuries, their connection becomes powerful, almost intimate. Meanwhile Addie circles back to her original life and home, searching for who she was--who she really is. But she finds no comfort there. She grapples with what it means to only be able to whisper in the world rather than shout. What is the value of a life that must be begun anew each day--a life no one else holds memories of? Then Addie meets a young man in a hidden-away bookstore--and he's the first person in almost three hundred years to remember her after she walks out the door, the next day, and every day afterward. At long last, she can say her true name to someone; she could even tell him her preposterous story of eternal life. But why is she able to break the rigid rules of the Darkness with him? And what secrets is he keeping from Addie? Any Bossy thoughts on this book? Schwab publishes adult books under this name (and young adult books under the name "Victoria Schwab"). She has also written the Villains series (two titles in that one so far) and the Shades of Magic series as V.E. Schwab. I mentioned this book (along with The Fighting Bunch and The Empress) in the Greedy Reading List Three Books I'm Reading Now, 12/2/20 Edition.

There's brutality and bravery in this spooky tale--and the atmospheric descriptions of the remote, tiny town setting created an eerie, claustrophobic feeling. The stories Immanuelle hears about her deceased mother Miriam all have one thing in common: her defiance of the Prophet. She was cut with the mark of the Prophet and was promised to him, but she was far from the submissive, obedient young woman held up as ideal in the land of Bethel. She became pregnant with Immanuelle by a man outside the small, secluded community and died when Immanuelle was born. When Immanuelle ventures into the Darkwood, she encounters the legendary witches she's heard tell of her whole life--and finds that her mother's rumored encounters with the coven really happened. She's given a long-lost journal detailing her mother's exile, thirst for vengeance, and plans for enacting evil spells against those who treated her poorly. Immanuelle also unwittingly offers power to a set of curses that threaten to destroy all of Bethel--unless Immanuelle can use the clues in her mother's devastating journal, her own hard-won realizations about her mother's intentions for her, and her new-found determination to defy the witches of the wood and their deadly vendettas and save her faulted community that is all she's ever known. I listened to Henderson's spooky book as an audiobook, and this dark, witchy tale felt perfect as winter is coming. There's brutality--facial mutilation for the multiple wives of the Prophet, burning wrongdoers on pyres, and other cutthroat approaches to justice--as well as incredible bravery on the part of Immanuelle and her friend Ezra, the Prophet's son. The twisted interpretations of the scripture by the Prophet and his unchecked, cruel power were disturbing, and the atmospheric descriptions of the remote, tiny town created an eerie, claustrophobic feeling. Any Bossy thoughts on this book? This was truly spooky. The descriptions of the witches alone may give me bad dreams, yeow! There's another book planned for this series; I hope the tides of power have turned in Bethel in book two. I mentioned this book (along with Notes on a Silencing and I'm Still Here) in the Greedy Reading List Three Books I'm Reading Now, 12/14/20 Edition.

But the books in the series also offer fantastically bratty episodes on the parts of various characters

Namesake was fantastic--although I didn't completely buy the wrap-up at the end and had a few other nitpicky It features the fantastic characters from book one, and the plot picks up with a new version of the fight McManus offers a little of everything in a fantastic mix of teamwork, a health scare, sibling tensions Lee's detail is just fantastic in terms of Green's emotions, hopes, dreams, everyday life at the time

With funny, heartwarming, heartbreaking, fantastically bizarre elements; imperfect and wonderful friendships

In the nine essays and short stories that make up Festival Days, the fantastic Jo Ann Beard explores

This was funny, sweet, steamy, and poignant--a fantastic summer light-fiction read that I loved. That book introduced the fantastic best-friend character of Felicity "Fizzy" Chen.

Macintyre also wrote the fantastic Spy and the Traitor, which was one of my Six Favorite Nonfiction Books I love listening to her fantastically raspy voice as she reads her memoir in audiobook form, and I'd

I loved this book. If you're in for a new character-driven, superhero-focused, smart, wicked, and action-packed book, this is it. I loooooved this book. Walschots hooked me immediately and completely, and I was going to be heartbroken if the story didn't hold up. But it did--and I was gleefully talking about the highlights of this book to the other people in this house frequently enough that they were likely a leetle irritated and ready for me to finish. If you're in for a new character-driven, superhero-focused, smart, wicked, and action-packed book, this is it. Anna is a hench. She's an expendable part of a data entry pool and works boring temp jobs...for villains. It's not like she's in the line of fire or taking part in dastardly plots. She sits behind a computer, she needs the steady paycheck--and she's got a grudging respect for the purity of the revenge missions of the "bad guys" (and girls, and others, including their sidekicks) who help her pay rent. She wears winged eyeliner, she doesn't put up with any good old boy chauvinism from heroes or anyone else, and she's so smart, her talents are probably going to waste. Then she's unexpectedly and accidentally involved in a violent clash of good and evil and is badly injured by a gallingly shiny superhero. She doubles down on her contempt for the good guys and her annoyance at how others see them as infallible when they're far from blameless. She digs into determining the actual costs--in lives and financially--of heroes' clumsy bashing around in the name of duty, and she sets out to reveal the details of the dark side of the superhero myth. (This part reminded me, in a good way, somewhat of the cost analysis of heroes that takes place in Incredibles 2.) Her clever behind-the-scenes revelations catch the eye of the darkest and most mysterious villain of all, Leviathan, who wants Anna on his staff full time. She's uncomfortable with commitment, but her new employer is giving her a blank check of resources to enact clever, systematic, whole-scale revenge on heroes. It's too incredible an opportunity to pass up. She assembles a team dedicated to her and to their (dark, brooding, sometimes surprisingly kind, and often silent) boss, building a "cruel little department" that begins to shoulder a large portion of the organization's work. Anna starts to believe that her talents (she has discovered a flair for data mining, moving around information, manipulating social media, and knowing her superhero foes' habits and weaknesses) might allow her to teach some of these golden boys and girls a lesson--even if it also requires her to reluctantly come out from behind the desk for some old-fashioned battling now and again. She's growing closer to her boss Leviathan, and sometimes her taste for hero destruction seems to be overpowering even his own. Walschots's writing and pacing in Hench is wonderful. She builds the world in her book gracefully--her job as a game designer probably plays into this ability. She provides lots of action; sometimes poignant internal conflict; some dark humor; and she builds history for the characters by retracing old superhero and villains' rivalries. Anna's singular, ruthless mission of revenge shapes her emotionally and physically and affects her interpersonal relationships. At times she doesn't recognize herself much anymore. But she can't stop trying to destroy the heroes' false perfection that is devastating so much of the world, and her struggle feels noble in many ways, even if her methods are not. She emerges as more brave than she had believed herself to be, and as she evolves, Walschots is able to make the reader question what good and evil really mean by having us view the hero/villain construct through Anna's eyes. I was delighted by the superheroes' and villains' names, their various supernatural abilities, and their complicated relationships--as well as how henches and sidekicks continued to crop up in others' employ, following the money and reinventing themselves as people might in any profession. There are performance reviews; the need for higher-ups to sign off on manpower requests and project plans; and other mundane concerns--except for the entertaining fact that they all center around superheroes and villains and their passion for mutual destruction. The one problem I have here is that while the tone of the ending feels like an appropriate level of wrap-up, issues remain (regarding June--!; Leviathan; Quantum; and Anna and her future, her mission, and her potential supernatural abilities) which deserve more delving into and will require another book in order to satisfy ME personally. Yet there is no number on this book, nor is there any mention of a sequel. I just hope that Walschots is with me on this and is already hard at work on the next book. I read a prepublication copy of this book courtesy of NetGalley and William Morrow; it's scheduled for publication on September 22. What did you think? Walschots is a game designer who has published two books of superhero-focused poetry (!), but although this is her first book, I thought her story-building and the story's depth felt effortless. More, please! This book brought to mind The Epic Crush of Genie Lo by F.C. Yee. Both offer unlikely heroes, action, and some dark humor, although Yee's young adult book is more playful, as are its examinations of good and evil. The dry humor in Hench also reminded me in a way of the Murderbot series (I review the first three books here). If you like this book, you might like those as well. I first mentioned Hench in my Greedy Reading List Three Books I'm Reading Now, 9/16/20 Edition.

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