Recent reading
Aug. 30th, 2018 06:14 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
luzulaOath of Fealty by Elizabeth Moon (2010, #1 in Paladin's Legacy, audiobook)
I bounced off this when it first came out, because I read the previous trilogy for Paks, and there isn't much of her here. There is still too little Paks, but I enjoyed it well enough as an audiobook. It's funny, I am both more and less picky when listening to audiobooks. I will listen to an audiobook either if I really like the reader, or if the reader is all right, and the book is entertaining and easy to digest. This was the latter, in the sense that I already know the characters.
In the David Graeber book I recently read, he claimed that in fantasy, only the evil side has bureaucracy. This is so not the case in Oath of Fealty. All three of the POV characters are people in positions of power who not only have to deal with bureaucracy, they care about getting it right and it is often shown onscreen even when there is no plot reason to do so (as are various logistical and organizational details).
City of Brass by S. A. Chakraborty (2017)
For my fannish book club. This is epic fantasy based on Islamic mythology with djinns and other supernatural creatures. We all enjoyed it, especially the worldbuilding and the shades of gray in the characters--there are various sides here that all have atrocities in their past and/or their present and try to justify themselves, and the characters are caught up in these conflicts. Will probably be reading the sequel when it comes out.
The Ecology of Agroecosystems by John Vandermeer (2011)
This book is excellent and will go up on my top ten this year. It's a textbook, so don't expect easy reading, but it is clearly and compellingly written. I've never seen quite this angle on agriculture before--the author views it as an ecosystem with humans as a keystone species and applies the principles of ecology to things like pest control, competition, facilitation, etc. But it's not just narrowly focused on ecology--there's history, economics and politics in here as well. There's also a very interesting chapter on soil science as well, which I've been meaning to learn more about. Highly recommended!
En skog av möjligheter by Ola Engelmark (2018, only in Swedish--title means A Forest of Possibilities)
Criticism of modern industrial forestry from the small forest owner's perspective. A bit too rambling for me, but I think that's just me wanting to read a different book.
I bounced off this when it first came out, because I read the previous trilogy for Paks, and there isn't much of her here. There is still too little Paks, but I enjoyed it well enough as an audiobook. It's funny, I am both more and less picky when listening to audiobooks. I will listen to an audiobook either if I really like the reader, or if the reader is all right, and the book is entertaining and easy to digest. This was the latter, in the sense that I already know the characters.
In the David Graeber book I recently read, he claimed that in fantasy, only the evil side has bureaucracy. This is so not the case in Oath of Fealty. All three of the POV characters are people in positions of power who not only have to deal with bureaucracy, they care about getting it right and it is often shown onscreen even when there is no plot reason to do so (as are various logistical and organizational details).
City of Brass by S. A. Chakraborty (2017)
For my fannish book club. This is epic fantasy based on Islamic mythology with djinns and other supernatural creatures. We all enjoyed it, especially the worldbuilding and the shades of gray in the characters--there are various sides here that all have atrocities in their past and/or their present and try to justify themselves, and the characters are caught up in these conflicts. Will probably be reading the sequel when it comes out.
The Ecology of Agroecosystems by John Vandermeer (2011)
This book is excellent and will go up on my top ten this year. It's a textbook, so don't expect easy reading, but it is clearly and compellingly written. I've never seen quite this angle on agriculture before--the author views it as an ecosystem with humans as a keystone species and applies the principles of ecology to things like pest control, competition, facilitation, etc. But it's not just narrowly focused on ecology--there's history, economics and politics in here as well. There's also a very interesting chapter on soil science as well, which I've been meaning to learn more about. Highly recommended!
En skog av möjligheter by Ola Engelmark (2018, only in Swedish--title means A Forest of Possibilities)
Criticism of modern industrial forestry from the small forest owner's perspective. A bit too rambling for me, but I think that's just me wanting to read a different book.
