Book Review: The Frugal Wizard's Handbook for Surviving Medieval England by Brandon Sanderson

Book 2 of Sanderson's Kickstarter is here and it's an interesting deviation from this usual style. Here's the blurb:

A man awakens in a clearing in what appears to be medieval England with no memory of who he is, where he came from, or why he is there. Chased by a group from his own time, his sole hope for survival lies in regaining his missing memories, making allies among the locals, and perhaps even trusting in their superstitious boasts. His only help from the “real world” should have been a guidebook entitled The Frugal Wizard’s Handbook for Surviving Medieval England, except his copy exploded during transit. The few fragments he managed to save provide clues to his situation, but can he figure them out in time to survive?

As a novella, I'll forgo my usual format and just write out some impressions. More after the jump.

Book Review: Encounter with Tiber by Buzz Aldrin and John Barnes

I was recommended this book because it was about space travel and by a famous astronaut. I hadn't heard about it before, but the premise sounded interesting and figured I'd give it a try. It ended up being pretty good. Here's a short blurb:

Born the year of the Moon landing, Chris Terence spends his life fighting to return humanity to that pinnacle. An engineering student with dreams of spaceflight, he finds upon graduation that the United States no longer has need for astronauts. Years of bureaucratic meddling have reduced the space program to a shell of itself, and it will take the greatest scientific find in history to send humanity skyward once more. After years battling budget hawks, Chris finally gets his chance to walk on the Moon. While there, he finds evidence of an ancient alien civilization, the Tiberians, who visited Earth’s satellite eight thousand years before. Understanding what happened to those long-forgotten travelers will define the lives of Chris and his son, as they fight against all odds to unlock the secrets of the universe.

Read on for my spoiler-free review.

Book Review: The Lost Metal by Brandon Sanderson

The Lost Metal is a long overdue conclusion to the Wax and Wayne series of Mistborn novels, the second era for the Misborn series. 

For years, frontier lawman turned big-city senator Waxillium Ladrian has hunted the shadowy organization the Set-with his late uncle and his sister among their leaders-since they started kidnapping people with the power of Allomancy in their bloodlines. When Detective Marasi Colms and her partner Wayne find stockpiled weapons bound for the Outer City of Bilming, this opens a new lead. Conflict between Elendel and the Outer Cities only favors the Set, and their tendrils now reach to the Elendel Senate-whose corruption Wax and Steris have sought to expose-and Bilming is even more entangled. After Wax discovers a new type of explosive that can unleash unprecedented destruction and realizes that the Set must already have it, an immortal kandra serving Scadrial's god, Harmony, reveals that Bilming has fallen under the influence of another god: Trell, worshipped by the Set. And Trell isn't the only factor at play from the larger Cosmere-Marasi is recruited by offworlders with strange abilities who claim their goal is to protect Scadrial...at any cost. Wax must choose whether to set aside his rocky relationship with God and once again become the Sword that Harmony has groomed him to be. If no one steps forward to be the hero Scadrial needs, the planet and its millions of people will come to a sudden and calamitous ruin.

Read on for my spoiler-free review, though bear in mind prior novels to this one are fair game when it comes to spoilers.

Book Review: The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

A friend of mine had recommended several books by Erin Morgenstern and I had read and thoroughly enjoyed The Starless Sea, so I figured it give The Night Circus a read. Instead of a magical library we have a magical circus. It seemed intriguing and atmospheric, here's the Goodreads blurb:

The circus arrives without warning. No announcements precede it. It is simply there, when yesterday it was not. Within the black-and-white striped canvas tents is an utterly unique experience full of breathtaking amazements. It is called Le Cirque des Rêves, and it is only open at night.

But behind the scenes, a fierce competition is underway—a duel between two young magicians, Celia and Marco, who have been trained since childhood expressly for this purpose by their mercurial instructors. Unbeknownst to them, this is a game in which only one can be left standing, and the circus is but the stage for a remarkable battle of imagination and will. Despite themselves, however, Celia and Marco tumble headfirst into love—a deep, magical love that makes the lights flicker and the room grow warm whenever they so much as brush hands.

True love or not, the game must play out, and the fates of everyone involved, from the cast of extraordinary circus performers to the patrons, hang in the balance, suspended as precariously as the daring acrobats overhead.

Written in rich, seductive prose, this spell-casting novel is a feast for the senses and the heart.

Read on for my spoiler-free review.

Book Review: Tress of the Emerald Sea by Brandon Sanderson

Tress of the Emerald Sea is the first of Sanderson's "Secret Project"- a set of four novels written during the height of the covid pandemic and being independently published. As a Sanderson fan I had to sign up for them since I knew they would be fun reads and indeed the first hasn't disappointed. Plus as a Cosmere novel it connects to his grander universe. I look forward to seeing what the other 3 will be.

The only life Tress has known on her island home in an emerald-green ocean has been a simple one, with the simple pleasures of collecting cups brought by sailors from faraway lands and listening to stories told by her friend Charlie. But when his father takes him on a voyage to find a bride and disaster strikes, Tress must stow away on a ship and seek the Sorceress of the deadly Midnight Sea. Amid the spore oceans where pirates abound, can Tress leave her simple life behind and make her own place sailing a sea where a single drop of water can mean instant death?

Read on for my spoiler-free review.

Book Review: At the Feet of the Sun by Victoria Goddard

This is the highly anticipated sequel to The Hands of the Emperor. While it follows a few months after that book,  I recommend those interested in this book read first The Return of Fitzroy Angursell and The Redoubtable Pali Avramapul at the very least. The stories there happen in tandem and set the stage for what will happen in this particular novel.

Cliopher Mdang has been appointed Viceroy of Zunidh by his beloved Radiancy, the Last Emperor, who has now left him behind in the Palace to safeguard the world during his absence on a quest to find an appropriately magical heir. When he returns, he will abdicate, and Cliopher will at last retire, satisfied with having achieved most of his life's political goals--even if his long-suppressed personal dreams are starting to bubble up.

(Surely he used to have hobbies besides running the government?)

All he has to do is wait patiently for his lord's return... until adventure quite literally hits him from behind, and what was once safely hypothetical becomes intensely real.

Cliopher has always followed the stars of his chosen course: the epic oral histories of his people, the poetry of the rebel poet Fitzroy Angursell, decades of devotion and service to his Radiancy... They were enough to change the world. But are they enough to guide Cliopher home?

Read on for my review, spoilers for the preceding books.

Book Review: The Redoubtable Pali Avramapul by Victoria Goddard

After learning of a delay to At the Feet of the Sun and at my friend's recommendation, I went ahead and picked up this book set in the same universe. We had already met Pali in prior novels so this was a chance to get to see her in more detail and see more about the various adventures of the Red Company. Here is the Goodreads blurb:

Before the Fall of the Empire of Astandalas, the Red Company was legendary. A dozen or so years after that cataclysm, they have almost faded into myth.

Pali Avramapul may not have gone under her own name since the dissolution of the Red Company, but she is no myth, and has certainly not faded. She fights folly and injustice as fiercely as ever—although, as a respected scholar of history at one of the Circle Schools of Alinor, she now tends to use her tongue and pen more than her sword.

She still keeps the sword sharp, of course. You never know when adventure will come calling.

She expects her sabbatical to be a decorous, respectable sort of adventure, the kind with which she can regale her colleagues in the Senior Common Room upon her return.

She’s not very upset when she finds one or two of her old friends and it turns out the adventure is much more likely to involve a plot to kidnap the Last Emperor of Astandalas.

There’s respectable, after all, and then there’s respectable.

Read on  for my spoiler-free review.

Book Review: Nona the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir

Nona the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir is the third book in The Locked Tomb series. This has been highly anticipated by fans all around. The series merges science fiction, fantasy, horror, with a splash of comedy and romance. It is weird and engaging in so many odd ways. The blurb for this one is pretty unusual as well, though it gets the point across:

Her city is under siege.

The zombies are coming back.

And all Nona wants is a birthday party.

In many ways, Nona is like other people. She lives with her family, has a job at her local school, and loves walks on the beach and meeting new dogs. But Nona's not like other people. Six months ago she woke up in a stranger's body, and she's afraid she might have to give it back.

The whole city is falling to pieces. A monstrous blue sphere hangs on the horizon, ready to tear the planet apart. Blood of Eden forces have surrounded the last Cohort facility and wait for the Emperor Undying to come calling. Their leaders want Nona to be the weapon that will save them from the Nine Houses. Nona would prefer to live an ordinary life with the people she loves, with Pyrrha and Camilla and Palamedes, but she also knows that nothing lasts forever.

And each night, Nona dreams of a woman with a skull-painted face...

Read on for my spoiler-free review; spoilers for the prior books (Gideon the Ninth and Harrow the Ninth) may be present, though.