The Lesser Joke: book reviews and more

Book Review: Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

Book #50 of 2016:

Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

An exciting blockbuster of a novel that absolutely deserves the Steven Spielberg adaptation it’s now getting, Ready Player One tells the story of a group of video game nerds going up against an evil corporation to follow a series of obscure clues left in the will of a reclusive billionaire. Most of the novel takes place within a virtual computer environment, and it’s to writer Ernest Cline’s great credit that the action is so clear and easy-to-follow. The whole novel is a great treasure trove of 80s pop / nerd culture references (as you might expect, given that the author also wrote the screenplay for the movie Fanboys), and the plot is great fun even when somewhat predictable. I really liked reading this one, and can’t wait for the movie to come out.

★★★★☆

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Book Review: Yes Please by Amy Poehler

Book #49 of 2016:

Yes Please by Amy Poehler

Amy Poehler’s first book is 50% hilarious memoir, 50% gentle self-help book, and 100% unabashed feminist tome. The only problem is that Poehler’s feminism is not very intersectional, and there were a few parts that really rubbed me the wrong way. On two separate occasions in Yes Please, she jokingly (?) calls a black person racist for mixing up two white people, and at another point she makes an anecdote about a time she mocked disabled people on Saturday Night Live all about her anguish over getting called out for it. She also spends most of the last chapter making tired and unfunny complaints about modern technology and the people who use it. I laughed a lot at this book, but the rough patches were far too frustrating for me to really recommend it.

★★★☆☆

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Book Review: The Arrivals by Melissa Marr

Book #48 of 2016:

The Arrivals by Melissa Marr

People from throughout earth’s history find themselves mysteriously transplanted to another world, where they awaken in bodies that do not age and can come back to life when killed. If that sounds interesting… then I strongly recommend To Your Scattered Bodies Go and its sequels in Philip José Farmer’s classic Riverworld series. I do not recommend Melissa Marr’s The Arrivals, which is a rather tepid exploration of the same general concept.

The characters in The Arrivals are thinly sketched, the worldbuilding is lazy, and the plot never really goes anywhere. I didn’t hate it, but probably because there simply wasn’t enough substance to the book to feel strongly about it at all. Don’t waste your time.

★☆☆☆☆

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TV Review: Game of Thrones, season 6

TV #34 of 2016:

Game of Thrones, season 6

This series has definitely entered its endgame, and it is an absolute thrill to watch all these far-flung characters and plots finally converge, even if the story logic isn’t always as sound as it appeared before. I think the writers have also been somewhat receptive to complaints about gratuitous nudity and sexual violence, as this season features more female empowerment than any previous one. But the biggest change is that they finally had no choice but to barrel forward into material that George R. R. Martin has not yet published — for both better and worse. The writing of the past few seasons has featured some feet-dragging to avoid overtaking the books, and the story is now officially free of all that. The result doesn’t always land like Martin’s own work, but the increased momentum is certainly fun.

★★★☆☆

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Book Review: The Rook by Daniel O’Malley

Book #47 of 2016:

The Rook by Daniel O’Malley (The Checquy Files #1)

The Rook begins like a Jason Bourne story, with its main character surrounded by assailants she has apparently killed but with no memory of anything before that moment. In execution, it’s more like Octavia Butler’s excellent vampire novel Fledgling, since our amnesiac heroine must quickly learn the rules of the supernatural group she finds herself in upon waking – but with the added wrinkle that this character decides to keep her memory loss a secret from the group while she hunts for the traitor behind her attack. In the process, she must learn all she can about who she used to be, while also discovering for herself who she is now and trying not to alert anyone in her organization with the discrepancies between the two.

This is a solid enough hook, and the character of Myfanwy Thomas is well-developed throughout the story. The worldbuilding is fun too, although the Checquy – a British secret agency tasked with defending the realm against supernatural threats – might be the most inept such organization since Torchwood. The plot is very rough in parts, however, especially when it deals with the secret traitor and their plans. We don’t get to spend enough time with the various characters in the Checquy to really be able to predict who the traitor might be, or to be particularly invested in their reveal near the story’s end. But as a whole, The Rook is a compelling entry into the world of Myfanwy Thomas and the Checquy, with the potential for excellence in its sequels.

★★★☆☆

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Book Review: Needful Things by Stephen King

Book #46 of 2016:

Needful Things by Stephen King

Needful Things is better than The Tommyknockers, but not as good as ‘Salem’s Lot – two other Stephen King novels that share its same basic story structure of a supernatural presence slowly corrupting and effectively destroying a small town. The fact that Needful Things is set in Castle Rock, home to several earlier King stories, lends a certain weight to the proceedings, although this is hampered by the relatively small number of recurring characters.

The larger problem is that the book’s villain never really seems like a plausible threat. He sells people their hearts’ desires in exchange for their promises to commit acts of mischief around town that set other residents against one another, but King doesn’t do a very good job of justifying why certain purchases – like a porcelain doll or a framed picture of Elvis Presley – would have such an effect on people. In fact, it’s clear at several points that the fiendish shopkeeper is actually hypnotizing his customers into buying from him, which weakens whatever the novel is trying to say about human weakness and culpability. A stronger story would have toned down the supernatural elements and had the Castle Rock residents make the Faustian bargains that ruin their town with clearer eyes.

★★☆☆☆

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Movie Review: The Martian (2015)

Movie #12 of 2016:

The Martian (2015)

This was my second time watching this movie, but my first time since reading the book it was based on. (I normally like to read a book before I see its movie adaptation, but the waiting list at my library for this one was super-long, and I really wanted to see the movie before it left theaters.) My assessment remains the same, though – both movie and book are great, but I like the movie a lot better. And it’s amazing how tense that scene near the end of the film made me, even though by this point I obviously know how it’s going to resolve. Anyway, as you probably know, this is a really cool story about an astronaut accidentally left to fend for himself on Mars, which he does by being really really smart while really really smart people back on earth try to figure out a way to rescue him. Definitely see it if you haven’t already, and you don’t need to read the book first.

★★★★★

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Book Review: The Quantum Thief by Hannu Rajaniemi

Book #45 of 2016:

The Quantum Thief by Hannu Rajaniemi (Jean le Flambeur #1)

I sympathize with speculative fiction writers who don’t want to explain things about their universe that would be obvious to its characters, but there still need to be some clues for readers to pick up on. The Quantum Thief throws you right into the deep end, with many basic elements of its story not making sense until roughly halfway through the text and others still unclear at its end. There are elements of this novel that are neat, but as a whole it’s a jumbled mess that simply doesn’t cohere.

★★☆☆☆

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Book Review: Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke

Book #44 of 2016:

Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke

This is at least the third time that I’ve read this book, but the last time was more than five years ago (which is why I wanted to do another reread before I watched the recent BBC miniseries adaptation). It remains an astonishing feat of literary voice and worldbuilding, with meticulous footnotes throughout the novel further fleshing out the alternate history of its version of England. My biggest worry approaching the adaptation is that the writers will be unable to convey the same feeling of that lived-in magical world that Susanna Clarke achieves. But on its own terms, the book is an undeniable classic of contemporary British literature.

★★★★★

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Book Review: Calamity by Brandon Sanderson

Book #43 of 2016:

Calamity by Brandon Sanderson (The Reckoners #3)

This conclusion to Brandon Sanderson’s trilogy about post-apocalyptic superpowers doesn’t quite stick the landing. For one thing, the villain set up at the end of book 2 turns out to be far less formidable than the foes David and the other Reckoners have faced before – which is particularly disappointing, since the personal stakes should have raised this last threat to the ultimate level. Sanderson also seems to have squeezed in a few too many details setting up his forthcoming sequel series, The Apocalypse Guard, which tends to obscure and distract from the story he’s telling here. Finally there’s quite a bit of face-your-fears mysticism to how the Reckoners story resolves, which is a rare misstep from an author who is usually so meticulous about the mechanics of his magical systems.

That being said, a below-average Brandon Sanderson novel is still a great story, and he delivers more of the solid Reckoners thrills we got in the first two volumes, with clever humans trying to defeat villains with a wide bevy of special powers. David continues to make absolutely appalling metaphors, the love story from the previous novels gets a little more time to breathe, we get another really cool city under bizarre Epic powers, and the dangling storylines and character arcs mostly resolve themselves. Calamity is definitely worth reading if you’ve enjoyed the first two Reckoners books, but you might be wise to lower your expectations for this one.

This book: ★★★☆☆

Overall series: ★★★★☆

Book ranking: 2 > 1 > 3

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