My science fiction era is in full swing, and Cixin Liu’s The Wandering Earth confirmed that for me. I’ve read a lot of short story anthologies, from Nail Gaiman’s works to Borges, and usually there are two really good stories with the others not standing out as much. But in the case of The Wandering Earth, each story surpassed the previous. I didn’t even know that was possible for a short story anthology! If this is what a lot of science fiction is like, I’m so excited for the future of my reading. Let’s go through each story one at a time, and of course, SPOILERS AHEAD!! The Wandering Earth The title story was…

My science fiction era has begun. I picked up Project Hail Mary exactly five minutes after I dropped Blood of Hercules, so the bar was admittedly pretty low. However, this book surpassed any of my expectations, and dare I say, some of the brain cells lost during the Greek myth ‘retelling’ managed to grow back. Science fiction is still a really new genre for me, as I have only read Children of Time and The Three-Body Problem. But I managed to figure out that experimentation and technology was my favorite part of the experience. Good thing Project Hail Mary was filled with that! I particularly enjoyed the way the novel was set up. The…

Flabbergasted. That is the only word I can think of to describe my mental state after reading half of this book. This is not a review because I didn’t finish Blood of Hercules, but I am absolutely going to document every little detail that caused me psychic damage. Some context: the author, Jasmine Mas, has a degree in ancient Greco-Roman classical studies from Georgetown University. I will be referencing this fact a lot.  Hoopla is an ebook library that doesn’t have any wait time to borrow books, but this means their collection is not really the most popular or up-to-date. I found this Greek myth retelling on the app, but I…

Currently, I’m feeling rather sick. So I thought maybe it would be a good idea to go back to my roots and try a YA fantasy novel! I have seen The Sunbearer Trials a lot at my local library, so I decided to give it a shot. It was a really nice read, but I think I can say that I’ve mostly outgrown YA novels. Everything about this duology was very well written and developed, and I would have loved it a couple years ago, but it’s just hard to appreciate now. But that’s ok! YA readers should definitely check this book out, because it was a fun exploration of Mexican…

Another R.F. Kuang book, another conundrum. I was expecting another Babel going into this, but Katabasis was most definitely not. And I don’t know if that’s a good or bad thing. Well, let’s get started! The first half of the book was pretty awful. Every second Alice and Peter spent in hell bickering with each other was so incredibly annoying; the writing felt very cringey and juvenile in comparison with the plot, which was supposed to be complex. For an example, I never want to hear the words “pizza anus” ever. It’s not funny or clever. It sounds stupid. It was little situations and mentions like these that made me…

This biography by Andrea Elliot was very impactful. It follows Dasani, a homeless African American girl who lives in New York City, throughout her childhood. Her story is representative of a completely different America those under the poverty line experience, and it is terrifying. The research Elliot did was remarkable to me; she gives the reader so much information about Dasani and her family. And getting to know Dasani through this book left me with so many confusing feelings. Dasani was around the same age as me by the end of the book, and we live in the same country. But that is where the similarities end. Her resilience comes…