Ricky Pine's Blog, page 30

Review: The Ballad of Never After

The Ballad of Never After by Stephanie Garber
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I was under the impression at first that Stephanie Garber was going to write her debut series Caraval as a duology, and then it turned into a trilogy. So it goes again with the second series of Garber’s fantasy realm, which I was expecting to be a duology conclusion last year, but it’s pretty clear with the ending of this book (a particularly mind bending cliffhanger) that we’re getting another trilogy. I...

Review: The Luminaries

The Luminaries by Susan Dennard
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

While we await the long-developing conclusion to Dennard's signature work in The Witchlands, here she brings us readers a smaller piece of more modern fantasy, based on the "Sooz Your Own Adventure" (as she called it) games she entertained readers with on Twitter a few years back. It's not an exact match to how the story went based on Twitter polls, but then again, I barely remember most of what went down in those poll...

Review: The Sunbearer Trials

The Sunbearer Trials by Aiden Thomas
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Aiden Thomas returns to the style of their debut novel Cemetery Boys in the start of their first official series, a duology said to be a Percy Jackson and Hunger Games hybrid in a world inspired by Mexican cultures (particularly the old legends of the Aztec and Maya) and very modern in its sensibilities. Naturally, Thomas writes a great number of LGBTQ+ characters, including trans protagonist Teo, who, while still...

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever - Don't Ever Say Marvel Has No Heart. Ever. Again.

 **NO SPOILERS FOR WAKANDA FOREVER, BUT SPOILERS FOR PREVIOUS MCU MOVIES AND SHOWS ABOUND WITHIN. YOU'VE BEEN WARNED.***

T'Challa is dead.

Long live the king.

You know you're in for a vibranium spear to the feels when this movie opens with Shuri scrambling in her lab to synthesize the heart-shaped herb, lost when Killmonger burned the whole crop in the first Black Panther movie almost a full five years ago, in a last-ditch attempt to save her ailing brother T'Challa. Not unlike Chadwick Boseman in ...

Review: Madly, Deeply: The Diaries of Alan Rickman

Madly, Deeply: The Diaries of Alan Rickman by Alan Rickman
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Alan Rickman…may he rest in peace. I was surprised to learn that one of the most iconic actors of this generation was a prolific diarist, and even more so that they were going to be published. Chronicling his life and career from 1993 through 2015, ending mere weeks before his death, we get to know a man of sharp wit, strong opinions, and terrific devotion to his craft and his friends. Freque...

Review: Babel, or the Necessity of Violence: an Arcane History of the Oxford Translators' Revolution

Babel, or the Necessity of Violence: an Arcane History of the Oxford Translators' Revolution by R.F. Kuang
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

R.F. Kuang's long awaited entry in the dark academia genre turned a lot of heads for months, even years, before its publication - and already the phenomenon is looking to repeat itself in her next novel Yellowface, her most realistic book yet but also very incisive in its social commentary from all the buzz I'm seeing about it already. Kuang is ...

Review: Poster Girl

Poster Girl by Veronica Roth
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Veronica Roth returns with not a sequel to Chosen Ones - though, as she admits, that one ends on a pretty good standalone note as it is. No, here she brings us another adult sci-fi piece with its roots in a world not out of place in YA, and especially not for one of the biggest riders of the early 2010s post-Hunger Games dystopian wave.

Poster Girl is a relatively bite size novel, especially for a story that's both sci-fi...

Review: Foul Lady Fortune

Foul Lady Fortune by Chloe Gong
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This one goes out to all the people hopping on a ton of Chloe Gong hate bandwagons these last two years: 
Sit there in your wrongness and be wrong and get used to it.
"without the monster, there is no madness. without the madness, he goes out of business."
These Violent Delights

"nothing was ever as simple as 'my people' or 'your people...'"
Our Violent Ends

"don’t upset me in the future and it will be swell, i suppose'"
Foul...

Review: Serwa Boateng's Guide to Vampire Hunting

Serwa Boateng's Guide to Vampire Hunting by Roseanne A. Brown
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Roseanne A. Brown has already proven herself as one of the best and brightest new arrivals on the YA scene in the last couple of years, and now that Rick Riordan’s selected her for his imprint, she’s gotten to prove her MG bona fides too. Serwa Boateng’s first adventure of many (as well it should be, after that cliffhanger!) is deeply rooted in the legends of Brown’s homeland of Ghana, and...

Review: The First to Die at the End

The First to Die at the End by Adam Silvera
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

It’s been a while since I’ve read an Adam Silvera book, and even longer since I read one that reminded me of why he was such a huge fave of mine for so many years, especially in my book selling days. I would’ve benefited so much from how beautifully Silvera writes his many glorious geekboys in love if I’d had these positive portrayals when I was a teenage bisexual stuck in the closet even to myself…but I di...