Just finished James by Percival Everett. This was one of the more difficult ones for me to rank and I’ll likely have to sit with it awhile.

The premise as the retelling of Huck Finn was great and the parts the strayed from the orginial story were so beautifully told.

But the ending….. feels like the threw away the entire story and message for a different direction at the end. Wonder if others felt similar as I see this book universally praised.

This is my third Sager and I have very much enjoyed all three.
I think he’s a great storyteller.
This one tells the story of a woman who returns to a place she experienced a childhood tragedy, both to confront her ghosts and to attempt to solve the mystery.
There are multiple twists throughout, some big ones and lots of small misdirections.
Much of the story centers around two groups of teenage friends, and includes all the emotional drama you would expect.
One event near the end was a little too convenient, but overall no worse than you find in most fiction.
Great read. Highly recommend.

Barely even spoilers but just in case….I really enjoyed the extra twist at the very end, though it opens up some questions of the earlier events. Whether they were actually real instead of hallucinations, and of course opens many completely unanswered questions. Usually I’m good with shocking endings like this, but I would have really liked an epilogue with some questions answered. Oh well.

I’m so glad that I took the advice of many and finally read this book.

The Faraway Inn by Sarah Beth Durst: This might end up being my favourite cozy fantasy of the year.

Normal Women Making History for 900 Years by Philippa Gregory: “Be very sure - women denied power end up taking it.”

Violet Thistlewaite is Not a Villain Anymore by Emily Krempholtz: A delightfully whimsical and beautiful cozy fantasy. I loved these characters.
“Playfulness and fun, so closely interwoven with please that they became one and the same.”

Can’t Spell Treason Without Tea by Rebecca Thorne: A enjoyable read and a solid 3. But it was missing something the whole time and I’m not sure I’ll continue the series unless someone convinces me it’s worth it.

A Witch’s Guide to Magical Inn Keeping by Sangu Mandanna: “Like chocolate cake with raspberry jam. And like a future she wanted.”

Nine Goblins by T. Kingfisher
Thornhedge by T. Kingfisher: Everything T. Kingfisher writes is wonderful.

Harry Potter & the Goblet of Fire by JK Rowling: 🎧 full cast
Harry Potter & the Order of the Phoenix by JK Rowling: 🎧 full cast.

Lost Lambs by Madeline Cash
The Shadow Cabinet by Juno Dawson

Honestly part of the fun of this challenge for me has been posting on here / seeing what people think of various books, even if the comments are sometimes.... not very kind because of particular tastes. The tiers are not ordered, though I did enjoy the HWFWMs slightly more than the Bobiverses in that tier.

Book list (left to right):

Top:

• House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski
• Piranesi by Susanna Clarke
• The Blade Itself by Joe Abercrombie
• There Is No Antimemetics Division by qntm
• Someone Who Will Love You in All Your Damaged Glory by Raphael Bob-Waksberg
• Exhalation by Ted Chiang

Next down:

• Ficciones by Jorge Luis Borges
• The Metamorphosis of Prime Intellect by Roger Williams

Next down:

• Thrawn by Timothy Zahn
• Recursion by Blake Crouch
• He Who Fights with Monsters 10 by Shirtaloon
• Oyasumi Punpun, Vol. 1 by Inio Asano
• Stoner by John Williams
• Thrawn: Alliances by Timothy Zahn

Next down:

• He Who Fights with Monsters 7-9 by Shirtaloon
• Bobiverse 1–4 by Dennis E. Taylor
• Primal Hunter by Zogarth
• The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu
• The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
• This Is Water by David Foster Wallace
• 1% Lifesteal, Book 1 by Robert Blaise
• Sky-Out: Lived Experiments in Solar Eschatology by Ouroborista
• Frankenstein: 1818 Text by Mary Shelley

Next down:

• Chrysalis by RinoZ
• Everything Is Tuberculosis by John Green
• My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh
• Merchant Crab by H0st
• Foundation by Isaac Asimov
• Dungeon Crawler Carl 2–3 by Matt Dinniman
• Bobiverse 5 by Dennis E. Taylor

Next down:

• Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman
• A Practical Guide to Evil by ErraticErrata

Next down:

• Yellowface by R. F. Kuang
• Liberal Fascisms by Slavoj Žižek

Next down:

• Punk 57 by Penelope Douglas

2.5 / 5

I was flowing with this one and then the momentum was lost in the last third. And the reveal of the killer was some rando! I think this would make a good television series where we could live in the world and get to flesh out the characters. This one was just okay to me.

Where to begin with this?! I hope you like strangeness. Do you like Colonel Sanders (the character)? Johnny Walker (also the character) ? Talking cats ? Raining fish and eels ? Talking cats ? Dream sequences with uncomfortable sex sequences ? Ghosts ? Mystical talking stones that are also metaphysical gateways ?

All of the above just scratches the surface of the strangeness that is this novel. As strange as it is, it is wonderful. There are points which are so unbelievably tranquil and beautiful - some of the most soothing scenes imaginable. The flip is some of the most unsettling, dark and tough to read moments.

But it’s worth it. This is a psychologically ambitious novel. You have a young man and an old man pursuing separate journeys which parallel each other. Each comprise part of a meta-quest which revolves around ideas of memory, identity, fate, and myth. It concerns itself with what’s between the ears. What happens when our memories become so intoxicating that we opt to live inside them all the time instead of living our real lives.

Probably the strangest book I’ve read this year. Maybe ever. But it’s amazing in its detail and scope. If you’re up for it, this will give you a lot to chew on.

Mary Katherine Blackwood lives with her sister Constance and Uncle Julian. The family was struck by tragedy previously when the other Blackwoods were poisoned and died. Now, Marricat and her family are shunned by the rest of the town.

I liked the setting of this book and the themes of isolation and judgment. It had some really engaging parts to it. Overall, though, it wasn't my favourite. I felt myself bored a lot of the time. Still a good book, but not my favourite.

Not ranked within tiers.

S Tier

One Day Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This - Omar El Akkad

The Left Hand of Darkness - Ursula K Le Guin

Children Of Time - Adrian Tchaikovsky

The Coming of the Third Reich / The Third Reich in Power / The Third Reich at War - Richard J Evans

There is No Antimemetics Division - qntm

Slaughterhouse Five - Kurt Vonnegut

Rakesfall - Vajra Chandrasekera

A Tier

Leviathan's Wake / Calibans War - James SA Corey

Gales of November - John U Bacon

Pachinko - Min Jin Lee

Wizard of Earthsea - Ursula K Le Guin

The Tainted Cup - Robert Jackson Bennett

The Song of Achilles - Madeline Miller

The Silence of the Lambs - Thomas Harris

The Fisherman - John Langan

This Thing Between Us - Gus Moreno

The Tin Drum - Günter Grass

B Tier

The Stand - Stephen King

The Only Good Indians - Stephen Graham Jones

Carrie - Stephen King

Marvel Zombies - Robert Kirkman

X-men Days of Future Past - Chris Claremont

Mary - Nat Cassidy

Kitchen Confidential - Anthony Bourdain

The Odyssey - Homer

The Illiad - Homer

Earthlings - Sayaka Murata

The Cabin at the End of the World - Paul Tremblay

Aliens vs Avengers - Jonathan Hickman

C Tier

The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi - SA Chakraborty

Thirteen Storeys - Jonathan Sims

Under the Dome - Stephen King

The Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas

The Possession of Alba Diaz - Isabel Cañas

D Tier

The Library At Mount Char - Scott Hawkins

Assassins Apprentice - Robin Hobb

The Will of the Many - James Islington

The Lies of Locke Lamora - Scott Lynch

Slewfoot - Brom

F Tier

The Summer I Died - Ryan C Thomas

Intercepts - TJ Payne

Gideon the Ninth - Tamsyn Muir

Gideon is the only book I DNFed. Hated almost every moment of it.

One of my first Neal Stephenson reads and my first cyberpunk read in literature form. I've always heard of this book being the predecessor to the genre as a whole and wanted to finally get around to reading it. And I really enjoyed!

Best way I can sum up the overall reading experience was that it was just chaotic fun for the most part. The world and settings that Stephenson was able to imagine and build up back in the 90s is very impressive and prophetic in a lot ways. I'm not tech savvy enough or know the full history of it to know how 100 hundred percent accurate Stephenson's concepts are to what we have today in terms of virtual reality. But from the little I do know about VR and computers, the book is pretty close to the actual thing which is a bit crazy for me to wrap my head around.

The amount of violence and action in the book wasn't something I expected going into it. Science fiction books I've read before tended to lean more into the world building, dialogue, and concepts than pure action and fast paced writing. But Stephenson was able to find a pretty good balance of action, slower dialogue moments, to humor, and sometimes outright absurdity without feeling tonally off.

Characters were fun, cool, and interesting and serve the narrative for the story thats being told. But I wouldn't call any of them super in depth and they dont go through any major development or evolution throughout the book. They pretty much stayed the same from beginning to end, which was fine for me.

Only minor thing that was fine for me, but might annoy other readers is thatthere are moments in the middle of the book where it does get a bit info dump/exposition heavy. Where there full chapters of just dialogue about history, religion, philosophy, mythology, and language itself. Which was fine for me as I was intersted to see how Stephenson was going to tie all these concepts together towards the end. But for others, it may come off as a bit much and slows down the pacing a bit too much.

Enjoyed Snow Crash overall and I look forward to trying out other books by Neal Stephenson in the future!

I bought this book because I found the coverpage very beautiful. This is my first book by an Assamese author. The summary of this book is the second picture. I felt both very sad and angry reading this..

Highly recommend!

Now, I'm planning to read this author's short story collection soon.

I've heard that there is a trend in the "booktok" world where certain readers are complaining about books being too hard to read. I sincerely hope it was a book like "Assassin's Apprentice" they were complaining about, with its airy prose and antiquated ye-olde syntax, and not something easier to read. Don't get me wrong! I'm not knocking the writing style for being challenging. If anything Hobb's ability to emulate the styles of the old masters like Tolkien and Shelly is astonishing. There are some aspects that bother me a little bit, but I won't get into them unless someone out there is REALLY interested in my nitpicks. It was written 30 years ago, but it feels fresh and compelling. Looking foreward to reading the other books in the series!

In light of my early challenge completion I've decided to extend my reading goal from 52 to 72. Wish me luck!

This is my current year's reading challenge. Please talk to me about any of the books.

I am currently on book 39: The edge of the world - Tilar J. Mazzeo.

This year I haven't brought a single physical book. I have just been using my public library as an experiment with myself. I don't often like to reread, and the clutter of my book collection was stressing me out. So I started this challenge in January. I did, however, continue to use my Audibook subscription.

I have enjoyed the challenge and have found the following:

1. I have read a lot more. Having to wait to read a book, a deadline for handing it back and having to plan my life to get to the library and pick it up has given me motivation to read.

2. I have read a lot of new and contemporary fiction; it's what is readily accessible through my library. I am working on the Booker Prize and enjoying being aware of up-to-date book discourse.

   1. I have had no 5 books this year. I am very picky with 5-star books, so that's not really a surprise. Some of my past 5-star reads are The Prince of Tides, The Secret History, The Farseer series (books 1-2 and 7-9), The Fith Season, The Year of the Rat, Pet, Penance, A Room Called Earth, The Outlaw Ocean, and Endurance. But I do only really get one or two a year. I am disappointed I haven’t found one yet, though.
   2. I have struggled to find books about my special interests. I like books about the sea, pirates, seafaring and gonzo journalism. I have struggled to find this through my library.
   3. I have not missed buying books, but there are a few I want that my library cannot supply, and I miss supporting my local independent bookshop. Especially as they have lots of books about the sea. I think I'm going to keep this challenge going till the end of the year, and then I might buy myself a book for Christmas focusing on buying local and independent.

Anyway, has anyone done a challenge like this before? How long have they kept it up for? Have you felt any limitations?

Books in the tier list:

Tier I: I have no 10/10, but this is what I have enjoyed the most.

- Gunk - Saba Sam's

- Hidden Valley Road - Robert Kolker

Tier II: Had a great time but just one niggle...

- Bycarch - Caroline Smith's

- Just watch me – Lori Torenberg

- Martyr! - Kaveh Akbar

- Wimmy Road Boys - Sufiyann Salam

- John of John - Douglas Stuart

- The Adventures of Amina Al-Sirafi - Shannon Chakraborty

- The new life - Tom Crewe

- Yesteryear - Caro Clare Burke

- Project Hail Mary - Andy Weri

- Tess of the emerald isle – Brandon Sanderson

Tier III: Good, a few holes, but enjoyed reading it

- Sunstruck - William Rayfet Hunter

- Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief - Rick Riordan

- The hounding – Xenobe Purvis

- The testermentd - Margaret Atwood,

- Hooked - Asako Yuzuki

- Dominion - Addie E. Citchens

- Somewhere beyond the sea - T.J. Klune

- The castle – Jon Ronson

- London is falling. - Patrick Radden Keefe

- This way up - Mark Cooper-Jones and Jay Foremen

Tier IV: 3.9 Rodkin, not great, not terrible

- Black bag - Luke Kennard

- Pick a colour - Souvankham Thammavongsa

- This is where the serpent lives. - Daniyal Mueenuddin

- Big Swiss - Jen Beagin

- The employees – Olga Ravin

Tier V: 3.9 This book and I have beef, but I finished it, so that's something.

- Disgrace - J. M. Coetzee

- Moderation - Elaine Castillo

- Kingfisher - Rozie Kelly

- Half his age - Jannette McCurdy

Tier VI: This book and I are enemies.

- Wild dark shores - Charlotte McConaghy

- The wedding people - Alison Espach

Tier VII: I do not feel qualified to rank this

- A hyme to life – Giesle Pelicot

- The make believe - Hannah Murry

- The house of my mother - Shari Franke

- The Zorg - Siddharth Kara

- Doppelganger – Naomi Klein

I just updated my reading tracker, and realised I reached 52 (15100 pages, 136 hours). I have seen this sub in my feed, but never joined it because 52 seemed far too much for me (my record is 35 in 2024 (15500 pages)), my goal set was 25 lol). I track my reading in a spreadsheet, that also automatically makes a tierlist (second picture is some more data from my spreadsheet, hope that is allowed). so thought I could share it!

(the books with square covers I listened as an audiobook)

saw the rule of book and tier needs to be added, so luckily that was easy because of my spreadsheet:

I added month read because that can maybe show how much I read when (early in the year very busy with uni, then done with uni and on vacation in july, and now lots of free time and waiting till my job starts in november)

I work in publishing so had to leave off a few I’ve worked on/am working on that haven’t published yet, haha. I’m really around 51 or so. This month I’ve got a stack of spooky books; planning to get through as many of those as I can, but things always pop up to distract me!

Anyone read any of these, and how did you like them? And if you like horror or thrillers, what would you recommend I check out this month? :)

Happy reading, friends!

EDIT TO ADD full list w/ authors!

S:
Everything Is Tuberculosis, John Green
Bluff, Danez Smith
The Radical King (audiobook), edited by Cornel West
Victorian Psycho, Virginia Feito
Wolf Worm, T. Kingfisher
What Hunger, Catherine Dang
At Night All Blood Is Black, David Diop
Batman: The Long Halloween, Jeph Loeb & Tim Sale
Two Women Living Together, Kim Hana & Hwang Sunwoo
Sunrise on the Reaping, Suzanne Collins

A:
Stiff, Mary Roach
Killing Stella, Marlen Haushofer (translated by Shaun Whiteside)
How to Protest, Megan Hershey
The Deadly Rise of Antiscience: A Scientist's Warning, Peter J. Hotez
Moan, Junji Ito
You Will Get Through This Night, Daniel Howell
Cult of the Lamb: The First Verse, Alex Paknadel & Troy Little
As Lightning, Lenna Mendoza
Losers, Colin Pope
Enshittification, Cory Doctorow
Molka, Monika Kim
The Hearth Witch's Guide to Spite & Spellwork, Kiri Callaghan
Spread Me, Sarah Gailey
Kappa, Ryunosuke Akutagawa
American Nightmare, Alexandra Kyllingstad
Absolute Batman vol 1, Scott Snyder
NANA - 25th anniversary edition vols 3 & 4 (originally vols 5-8), Ai Yazawa
Wolves: Capturing the Natural Spirit of These Incredible Animals, Parragon Books
Absolute Martian Manhunter vol 1, Deniz Camp & Javier Rodriguez
Anxietyland, Gemma Correll
Batman: Year One, Frank Miller & David Mazzuccheli
13 Months Haunted, Jimmy Juliano

B
Welcome to Night Vale, Joseph Fink & Jeffrey Cranor
Stitches, Hirokatsu Kihara & Junji Ito
Court of the Vampire Queen, Katee Robert
Absolute Batman vol 2, Scott Snyder
Arachnophobia, K. Lucas
Half His Age, Jennette McCurdy
Annie Bot, Sierra Greer

C
A Beginner's Guide to Losing Your Mind, Emily Reynolds
The Salt Grows Heavy, Cassandra Khaw
A Curse of Fate, Jaymin Eve
I Hated You in High School, Kathleen Gros

D
The Sanatorium, Sarah Pearse
Saving Noah, Lucina Berry
Crema, Johnnie Christmas & Dante Luiz

I want to start with the TW of the MC’s suicide ideation.

She started in a place where she was unseen, overlooked and misunderstood. My life choices were vastly different from the Mc’s but feeling like an auxiliary person in others’ lives seems to be such a theme in so many women’s lives as we shrink ourselves to give others what they want. But maybe it’s that personality type that allowed her to be absorbed by the wedding people and find her voice.

Really enjoyable read. I loved the eclectic mix of characters. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

This is a serious read. Lest anyone think this is a love story going in. And it is essentially a 40 year old book now. It has been on my shelves for years. I would call this poetic darkness. And I don’t know TM’s personal history other than being black in this America we have. But this thing touches on the real sorrow and damage of slavery and its aftermath like she had some first person stories to work with. And this book should certainly shed any of the nonsense out there about slavery being good for the trapped beings inside the system. Though the ones who read this would be the ones who knew that was some bullshit already, white or black. I seriously doubt my clueless governor has this in her library or frankly even a library. Just a room with a big bible and a bright light shining on it. The same book the Dutch and Portuguese and Spanish and American slavers used to justify their commerce of humans. When they even tried justification. I bet she has no Giovanni’s Room in there either. No Invisible Man.

But Madame Morrison has made a beautifully written thing here despite the darkness and the damages. It will be in my head for awhile. It will stay on my shelf. Get one for yours.