Book #346 of 2021: You Feel It Just Below the Ribs by Jeffrey Cranor and Janina Matthewson This novel technically takes place in the dystopian setting of authors Jeffrey Cranor and Janina Matthewson’s “Within the Wires” podcast, but you don’t need to have listened to that first in order to enjoy it — all I’ve …
Author Archives: Joe Kessler
Book Review: Gods of Riverworld by Philip José Farmer
Book #345 of 2021: Gods of Riverworld by Philip José Farmer (Riverworld #5) This somewhat-vestigial sequel to the core Riverworld plot is actually an improvement over the past couple titles, although it’s still not great. Having finally reached the grand tower at the head of the river in the previous story, the remaining protagonists spend …
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Book Review: Nine Dragons by Michael Connelly
Book #344 of 2021: Nine Dragons by Michael Connelly (Harry Bosch #14) The Liam Neeson movie Taken came out in 2008, and it sure seems like author Michael Connelly was trying to ride its coattails for this Bosch novel the following year. The start of the story concerns a liquor store robbery-homicide that may have …
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Book Review: Elfangor’s Secret by K. A. Applegate
Book #343 of 2021: Elfangor’s Secret by K. A. Applegate (Animorphs Megamorphs #3) Is there any Animorphs opening more unsettling than this one, with its in-media-res presentation of an alternate universe where our heroes are still fighting the same covert alien invasion, but as citizens of a racist, slave-holding empire? Rachel is nowhere to be …
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Book Review: Medical Bondage: Race, Gender, and the Origins of American Gynecology by Deirdre Cooper Owens
Book #342 of 2021: Medical Bondage: Race, Gender, and the Origins of American Gynecology by Deirdre Cooper Owens An incredibly heavy yet informative read on how the modern field of gynecology was created in the age of American slavery, with enslaved black women its unwilling participants. They were involved as patients for experimental techniques, of …
Book Review: Towards Zero by Agatha Christie
Book #341 of 2021: Towards Zero by Agatha Christie (Superintendent Battle #5) A delightfully twisty Agatha Christie piece, and a de facto end to her Superintendent Battle series. That investigator is more present here than he often is for his novels, but he still doesn’t dominate with an oversized personality as Poirot or Miss Marple …
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Book Review: Search for Senna by K. A. Applegate
Book #340 of 2021: Search for Senna by K. A. Applegate (Everworld #1) [I read and reviewed this title at a Patreon donor’s request. Want to nominate your own books for me to read and review (or otherwise support my writing)? Sign up for a small monthly donation today at https://patreon.com/lesserjoke !] I’m a bigger …
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Book Review: Defending Elysium by Brandon Sanderson
Book #339 of 2021: Defending Elysium by Brandon Sanderson [Disclaimer: I am Facebook friends with this author.] This novella from 2008 is one of author Brandon Sanderson’s earliest published works, still freely available on his website although now re-released for purchase as an official tie-in to his later Skyward / Cytoverse series. Set centuries beforehand, …
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Book Review: Terciel and Elinor by Garth Nix
Book #338 of 2021: Terciel and Elinor by Garth Nix (The Old Kingdom #6) It’s always a pleasure to return to the Old Kingdom, that snowy landscape of necromancy and Charter Magic where the hereditary line of Abhorsens wield their seven enchanted bells to put the dead back to rest. Nevertheless, author Garth Nix has …
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Book Review: The Sickness by K. A. Applegate
Book #337 of 2021: The Sickness by K. A. Applegate (Animorphs #29) I’m not ordinarily a fan of unrelated subplots coincidentally happening at the same time, and so I rolled my eyes a bit at the start of this novel, when two crises crash down upon the Animorphs at once. At a school dance — …
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