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Ideally I'd write long and highly detailed reviews of all the books I've read and games I've played, but who's really got time for that sort of thing? Not me unfortunately so instead what we have here are mini reviews - a line or two at most - of the books I've read so far in 2022. I'm not going to give many details of the books themselves, this is really just intended to capture my immediate thoughts, and how I felt after finishing the book. It's probably worth mentioning that even if I didn't particularly like the book, then that's not to say it's bad (Old Man's War aside), it's just that it didn't work for me this time. The first time I read The Centauri Device I wasn't really taken with it, and since then it's become one of my very favourite books.
If you're so inclined I'm also on Goodreads, although I don't usually bother to post reviews there (Old Man's War aside, couldn't help myself with that one):
Link to my profile on Goodreads
Currently reading: The Institute by Stephen King
Long time Alastair Reynolds fan, but his recent space pirate material really hadn't worked for me at all. While being quite different from the harder sci-fi Revelation Space novels this was still absolutely great, and kept me hooked right the the end. Reminded me somewhat of the sadly never to be completed 1899 on Netflix.
Winner of both the Nebula and Hugo awards for best novel, and it's not hard to see why. Really enjoyed this, although I found the middle section dragged a little. Asimov's puerile breast obsession grates in the third section, but that aside it's classic sci-fi and full of great ideas.
Not read any Christopher Priest before and really loved this book. There's a real sense of "what is going on?" all the way through, and it has the common decency to come to a satisfying conclusion rather than requiring you to read through another five books in some endless series. Decided that I need to read more Christopher Priest.
Proper old-school sci-fi yet still a great read. Interesting to see how relevant the financial impacts on people's lives are today some sixty years after it was first published.
Disappointing - an interesting(ish) premise and raises some deep philosophical issues before veering away from trying to answer or even discuss any of them in any detail. Could have been better, but at least it was a quick and (very) easy read.
What is there to say, it's Philip K. Dick! It's deeply odd, involves mind altering drugs, and it's never clear what's really going on. Unusually it also comes to what I thought was quite a clean and insightful ending.
Sequel to Dogs of War, also brilliant, although perhaps it lacks the impact of the first.
Brilliant book, read it immediately.
I've never been particularly taken with Greg Bear for some reason, but the premise of the book was amazing, and the first half of this book was great, and it seemed to be really going somewhere. After that it never seemed to quite go where I expected though, and so I ultimately found it to be a bit of a disappointment. It's a well regarded book so it sounds as though I'm in a minority with this one.
Well it was better than Old Man's War, but perhaps not that much better. Another very easy read that started off really well, but somehow never got to the level that it could have done.
Err yeah, where to start? I don't normally leave reviews on Goodreads, but I really couldn't help myself with this so I'll just include it here:
Don't normally write reviews, but found this to be absolute garbage. Have read children's books with more depth. Doesn't deserve to be mentioned along with Starship Troopers and The Forever War.
Perhaps it's because I was expecting something better, and perhaps it's just not understanding why this is so well liked, but it really didn't work for me.
This is an incredibly highly rated book, and I'd put off reading it for a long time, mostly because it's the first of a series. Annoyingly it's every part as good as everyone says it is, and now I have to read the rest of the series.
The first Adrian Tchaikovsky book that I read, and it's just wonderful. Proper writing, proper ideas, loved everything about it. Even the cover art is stunning.
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