Book Review: The Virtues of War

As I continue to work my way through this list of 36 Historical novels covering Ancient Greece, two names always bring a smile to my face as they reoccur, Mary Renault and Steven Pressfield. Renault's work gives such an interesting look at aspects of the Ancient world I'm not as familiar with, such as the lives of actors, poets, and even occasionally, kings. Pressfield, on the other hand, wows me both with spectacle and how he pairs ancient philosophies with the events he describes.

His 2004 novel, The Virtues of War begins with Alexander the Great nearing the end of his conquest in India, and looks back across his life at many of the key battles he fought. Pressfield works hard to show Alexander's military genius and after reading Scott Oden's Memnon, I found myself approaching the battles between Alexander and the Persian general with trepidation; I knew how everything would turn out, but had previously only seen it from the other side.

The novel was a really great look at Alexander's world from his own point of view, and although perhaps not as lyrical as Renault treated the same source material, a really excellent read.

Book Review: Wanderers of Time, by John Wyndham

I can't honestly say when I read my first John Wyndham novel, but if I had to guess it would have probably been sometime in Junior High (88-91) and was most likely either Day of the Triffids or The Midwhich Cuckoos.

For me his books were an early introduction to post-apocalyptic fiction and his mix of end of the world terror with a sort of middle class 50s United Kingdom mindset was a great introduction to the sub-genre for me.

Over the past few years I've collected a number of his books and this month dug into my first, Wanderers of Time which is a short story collection of some science fiction he wrote in the 1930s. With stories ranging from Time Travel to space adventure and two pretty interesting horror stories (one a sort of Mummy on the moon and the other a terrifying example of bio terrorism), I was quite impressed and am definitely looking forward to reading more.

Book Review: The Obelisk Gate, by N.K. Jemisin

Following up on The Fifth Season, N.K. Jemisin's The Obelisk Gate continues Essun's story, but this time includes the point of view of her daughter Nassum as well. In an attempt to stay away from spoilers, as the book is only a few years old, I will say that although I was a pretty big fan of the first novel, the second one took the concepts and world building from its predecessor and starting looking at them in detail, including a much more in depth look at the stone eaters and the character of Hoa.

I'm really interested to see where this series is going and although I'm still not certain as to whether I'll ever own copies of it myself, I'm finding this tragic, intimate story to be much more affecting than I was initially expecting.

Movie Review: A Quiet Place

John Krasinski's A Quiet Place begins with an intriguing concept; what if there were creatures that could kill you if you made any noise? Following an alien invasion (I'm assuming, the particulars are never mentioned), creatures have effectively overtaken the earth in a matter of months and those who still live on day 89 (where the film begins) only do so by keeping incredibly quiet.

The film follows a family as they attempt to deal with their new world, and for me the family drama going on was one of the most exiting parts of the film. Yes, the monsters are quite scary and the tension is very high, but by stripping away almost all spoken dialogue, you are left focusing on the actors faces and actions. Both leads, John Krasinski and Emily Blunt were really fantastic, but for me the standout was Millicent Simmonds, who was really fantastic throughout.

Also, the experience of watching the film in a packed theatre, where the only sounds were people occasionally coughing or rustling their bags of popcorn, made the film much more immersive for me.

Ultimately the film comes down to questions of what would you do to keep your family safe? What I loved was the fact that is in effect asked not just of the parents, but of the children as well. An incredibly engrossing film, and one I would gladly see again.

Book Review: The Fifth Season

Picking up N.K. Jemisin's 2015 novel The Fifth Season last month for a book club read, I wasn't really sure what to expect. My rule of thumb when it comes to books I've decided ahead of time to read is to entirely ignore the back cover and end pages, basically anything that might tell me what the book is about, as I figure that's simply advertising for a book I've already agreed to read.

What I knew about the book going in was:

1) It had won the 2016 Hugo for best novel - so I was looking at Science Fiction
2) My friend Mike (who has himself read his way through most of the Hugo winners since they began in 1953) picked it

So I start this book about a woman called Essun and the very first thing I notice is that the book is written in second person - the first chapter begins:

You are she. She is You. You are Essun. Remember? The woman whose son is dead.

You're an orogene who's been living in the little nothing town of Tirimo for ten years. Only three people here know what you are, and two of them you gave birth to.

Well. One left who knows, now.

For me, this immediately pulled me into the narrative, starting with this woman's tragedy and over time finding the stories of two other women, Daraya, a young child taken from her home and Syenite,an orogene paired with a curmudgeon named Alabaster for further training and breeding.

The story was often a hard read, and the broken Earth described by Jemisin was a strange and fascinating world for me to explore. In the end I liked the book enough to follow up with the sequel The Obelisk Gate within a few weeks, and I've got the final novel in the trilogy The Stone Sky on hold at my local library.

A really facinating read, and one that I would definitely recommend checking out.