Reading roundup

 

Chivalry - Neil Gaiman and Colleen Doran: a lovely graphic novel version of Gaiman's short story about an elderly widow who buys the Holy Grail in her local Oxfam shop.

Legendborn - Tracy Deonn: I read this because Deonn was shortlisted for the Astounding Award for Best New Writer. Legendborn is a YA take on King Arthur where the reincarnations of Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table have migrated to the USA and become a campus secret society in Carolina. I thought it was entertaining enough, with some interesting commentary on race and privilege, but it was very, very YA and I didn't find it entirely convincing.

What Souls Are Made Of - Tasha Suri: postcolonial reworking of Wuthering Heights, exploring how Cathy and Heathcliff's story might have been changed through the acknowledgement of a racialised context. Aimed at the YA market, and occasionally a bit kids' adventure story, but I liked it much more than I ever managed to like the original.

A Prayer For the Crown-Shy - Becky Chambers: the sequel to A Psalm For the Wild-Built is even more delightful; a gentle and charming exploration of a gently utopian world where people are still people, and still have problems, and learn to resolve them by connecting with each other. I really hope that Chambers is going to write more Monk and Robot books.

Heartstopper vol 3 - Alice Oseman: just as lovely as the first two, as Nick and Charlie and their friends go on a school trip to Paris.

Take a Hint, Dani Brown - Talia Hibbert: the second in Hibbert's series of romance novels featuring the three Brown sisters. Dani Brown is a junior academic who is looking for no-strings sex and definitely doesn't want commitment; Zaf is a former professional rugby player and incurable romantic who works as a campus security guard. Fun, fluffy fake dating romance.

Lands of Lost Borders - Kate Harris: I really enjoyed this account of the author's cycling trip along the Silk Road, from Istanbul to northern India via China and Tibet; Harris managed to capture the mixture of gruelling slog and utter joy of undertaking a long journey entirely under one's own steam perfectly, alongside describing the varied landscapes she and her friend travel through and their encounters with locals along the way. (There's also a Facebook gallery of photos which I enjoyed working through after I'd finished reading the book, because it turns out that I can't actually imagine how high the Himalayas are.)

How to be Brave - Daisy May Johnson: a modern take on the classic school story, featuring rare ducks, nuns with helicopters and lots of biscuits. Great fun, and I think I need to buy a copy for my nieces.

A Pig of Cold Poison - Pat McIntosh: the seventh of McIntosh's Gil Cunningham mysteries set in medieval Glasgow. Enjoyable whodunnit though, as often with this series, a basic familiarity with the murder mystery genre makes it much easier for the reader to tell whodunnit than poor Gil, hampered by lack of genre savvy and modern scientific understanding.

Penric and the Shaman - Lois McMaster Bujold: the second of the novellas about Penric and Desdemona sees Penric on the track of a missing shaman who is implicated in a murder. Bujold's world of the Five Gods is a fascinating setting, and this was another nice gentle story (and also features a Very Good Doggo, which is always a bonus).

Husband Material - Alexis Hall: the sequel to Boyfriend Material (why yes, I do seem to be reading a lot of books in series at the moment, it's almost as if the world is terrible and I want the comfort of known quantities) picks Luc and Oliver up two years into their relationship, when suddenly everyone around them seems to be getting married. This is just as hilarious and delightful as the first book; the structure is, basically, Four Weddings And A Funeral, just much less heteronormative, and it is an utter joy.

The Green Man's Foe - Juliet E. McKenna: yes, another sequel, this time to The Green Man's Heir. This one takes Daniel Mackmain to the Cotswolds, where he is employed to project manage the conversion of a stately home into a luxury hotel, while also trying to get to the bottom of the unsettling secrets of the woodland on the estate. I'm still enjoying this series a lot.