Book #84 of 2023: Yellowface by R. F. Kuang A scathing dark satire of race, the internet, and the contemporary publishing landscape. Our protagonist is a great antihero in the tradition of Tom Ripley or Shakespeare’s Iago who secretly resents a more successful friend — only in this case, she never acts against her in …
Author Archives: Joe Kessler
Book Review: Magical Bears in the Context of Contemporary Political Theory by Jenna Katerin Moran
Book #83 of 2023: Magical Bears in the Context of Contemporary Political Theory by Jenna Katerin Moran I had complicated feelings about the intense weirdness of author Jenna Katerin Moran’s novels Fable of the Swan and The Night-Bird’s Feather, but in each case, I gradually came around to the volume’s charms and felt like it …
Book Review: Orion by Ben Bova
Book #82 of 2023: Orion by Ben Bova (Orion #1) I loved this science-fiction novel — and to a lesser extent the loose series that follows — when I was a teen, and I’m glad to find that it holds up pretty well today. It’s definitely a product of its 1984 publication date in some …
Book Review: A Flaw in the Design by Nathan Oates
Book #81 of 2023: A Flaw in the Design by Nathan Oates This story idea had potential! English professor Gil has been estranged from his millionaire sister for years, ever since her troubled son tried drowning the man’s daughter when they were kids. Now he’s 17 and orphaned, and his parents’ will has sent him …
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TV Review: I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson, season 3
TV #31 of 2023: I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson, season 3 I laughed during every episode, if not necessarily during each sketch. As usual, comedian Tim Robinson’s offbeat humor fluctuates between entertaining and simply off-putting, with a bit too much angry shouting for my tastes and plenty a skit that either goes …
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Book Review: Witch King by Martha Wells
Book #80 of 2023: Witch King by Martha Wells I am all for complex fantasy worldbuilding, but it’s not a great sign that at the end of this standalone novel, I still don’t believe I could accurately summarize the distinctions it draws between demons, witches, expositors, blessed immortals, hierarchs, and the like, all of whom …
TV Review: Gilmore Girls, season 5
TV #30 of 2023: Gilmore Girls, season 5 This is kind of a weird season of television! I’m not sure if I ever noticed before this rewatch, but this does seem to be the point where the series starts running out of ideas, making some choices that don’t feel especially true to the established characters …
Book Review: Noli Me Tángere (Touch Me Not) by José Rizal
Book #79 of 2023: Noli Me Tángere (Touch Me Not) by José Rizal By sheer coincidence, I finished reading this title on the Philippines’ Independence Day, exactly 125 years since that nation’s revolutionaries declared its freedom from Spain. That’s rather fitting, as the 1887 novel in some ways seems to have inspired their movement against …
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Book Review: Clariel by Garth Nix
Book #78 of 2023: Clariel by Garth Nix (The Old Kingdom #4) I like a lot of things about this Old Kingdom prequel, but it’s objectively a pretty disjointed novel. The first two-thirds paint a fascinating picture of the setting as we’ve never seen it, both by virtue of being so far in the past …
TV Review: Star Trek: Enterprise, season 3
TV #29 of 2023: Star Trek: Enterprise, season 3 Credit where credit’s due: this season is a solid step up in quality for what’s previously been the weakest iteration of Star Trek to date. It’s still not a total success story, but this run makes a lot of smart choices to shake up its formerly …
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The Lesser Joke: book reviews and more 