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In [b:Penric's Demon|25791216|Penric's Demon (Penric and Desdemona, #1)|Lois McMaster Bujold|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1436108514s/25791216.jpg|45642232] we were introduced to Penric, a young man who, by accident, comes into possession of a demon, Desdemona.

Penric and the Shaman sees Penric and Desdemona a few years later. Penric, now Learned Penric, sorcerer in Princess-Archdivine's court, becomes involved in a murder case.

The relationship between Penric and Des has mellowed a bit. Penric has grown, become more sure of himself, Even if Des makes her voice heard as well, it's really Penric that's the main character, not the combined entity of Penric and Desdemona.

As Penric's Demon, Penric and the Shaman flows beautifully. It tells a complete, compelling story that is straight-forward fantasy; even though you can read some deep meanings into it, it's still mostly an adventure. And you know what? It's an excellent one.

Also, this again reminds me what an excellent writer Lois McMaster Bujold is, and how I need to read everything by her. It's been too many years since I last read Vorkosigan novels, and I've completely missed the earlier World of the Five Gods novels.

I read The Horror at Red Hook as a background for [b:The Ballad of Black Tom|26883558|The Ballad of Black Tom|Victor LaValle|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1447086249s/26883558.jpg|46932536], because it's basically a retelling of this Lovecraft's story.

As other reviewers have said, Lovecraft's racism is clearly on display here. It's not thinly veiled, it's not just the way people thought back then; the way Lovecraft describes first his wholesome white main character and then the black and Asian as basically Devil worshippers and evil by nature makes it a heavy read. Lovecraft does manage to build that creeping horror of his in there, so if you're not bothered by the blatant racism, this might be a story for you.

This did make me value [a:Victor LaValle|1762294|Victor LaValle|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1280959466p2/1762294.jpg] more, though, so I do think reading The Horror at Red Hook might be beneficial to understanding what is happening in The Ballad of Black Tom. That isn't exactly a high praise for The Horror at Red Hook, but that's best I can offer.

Tommy Tester is a small time hustler, trying to make ends meet for himself and his father. When his businesses lead him first to Ma Att and then Robert Suydam, it slowly becomes clear that he's dealing with forces beyond human comprehension.

Victor LaValle sets to retell a story of H.P. Lovecraft's [b:Horror at Red Hook|2582189|The Horror at Red Hook|H.P. Lovecraft|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1266939978s/2582189.jpg|2598040]. It's definitely his own take on the issue - starting from the fact that Tommy Tester doesn't appear in Lovecraft's original. Even if Malone is the second main character in The Ballad of Black Tom and the main character of Lovecraft's story, LaValle makes him more of an active participant in the events than Lovecraft ever did.

I have to admit, even though I thought The Ballad of Black Tom was competently written, I wasn't too keen on it. I'm not a fan of Lovecraft, and I don't quite get the enthusiasm of authors willing to rewrite his stories - or in some way, reclaiming his mythos from the racist abyss where people have slowly realized it probably belongs.

However, after reading The Ballad of Black Tom, I decided I need to read the original as well, and that made me see it anew. I still would probably enjoy more reading something different from LaValle, but I have to hand it to him. Taking Lovecraft's blatantly racist story, rewriting it from black perspective and adding social commentary, all the while managing to maintain the creeping atmosphere Lovecraft stories undeniably have is a commendable feat.

All the Birds in the Sky combines urban fantasy with science fiction and adds some romance and erotic scenes into the mix. It starts off with something like young adult book, but dark themes, graphic scenes and social commentary don't quite fit that bill.

The book is divided into two parts. In first, Patricia and Laurence are children. Both are different from others, so they get bullied in school. When they end up in the same school, it's natural they become friends and trustees for each other.

Years later, they meet again. This time Patricia is a full blown witch, and Laurence is a flashy technological mastermind. In their own ways, both are trying to save the world, but since the other is working with magic and the other with technology, a clash is inevitable.

The first part of the book seems it's written the way child would see things: Patricia's sister is a sadist, both children's parents are unequivocally horrible and adults in generally have hard time understanding anything. In the latter part, this gets replaced with some kind of ironic take of hipsters which is occasionally amusing but mostly would've been better left out altogether.

All the Birds in the Sky deals with the end - and possible future - of humanity. It invokes images of climate change as well as societal collapse. Anders doesn't quite spell it out loud, but from what I can gather, her view seems an entirely plausible end of the world. Apart from magic and time travel, that is.

The story gets chaotic towards the end, so much that the plot almost disappears. In the end Anders manages to pull it all together. The structure of the plot is very movie-like, from episodic climaxes to epic final scenes. This, in addition to obvious opportunity for sequels, makes it seem a bit calculated in the end.

The Dream-Quest of Vellitt Boe is a fantastic tale of an adventure in Dreamlands. It's a story about a teacher trying to find her lost pupil, but more than that, it's a tale of an aging woman finding herself after being seemingly content for years.

Johnson's story is adjacent to Lovecraft's The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath, but reading Lovecraft is by no means required to enjoy this book. Exactly opposite, in fact - whereas Lovecraft was a tedious and meandering read, this is an interesting and well thought tale.

Having said that, though, something of Lovecraft seems to have oozed into the structure of the story: Vellitt Boe is in great hurry to move through Dreamlands, and even if it's more coherent than Lovecraft's take, it still seems somewhat aimless. The final scenes, on the other hand, are handled hastily even if they pack whole lot of meaning in them.

I don't really care about ghouls, ghasts and gugs, so I'm willing to bet Vellitt Boe would've been a lot more interesting without the Lovecraft connection. As it is, though, it's still a lot better book than its predecessor.

Mess of a story with worst ending ever

Aqib is a young man of a diminished family, their last hope to ascend back to relevancy. Lucrio, on the other hand, is a warrior from Daluz, part of a delegation to Olorum. One night they meet and fall in love.

A Taste of Honey begins as a carnal love story but soon moves towards social critique. It's only too bad it's done in so hamfisted way. The story magnifies traditional gender stereotypes, adds in toxic masculinity and builds on that.

While it does break the mold in places - Aqib running family while his wife pursues career, intellectual endeavours being the realm for women - it doesn't really manage to explore either the romantic or the societal plot line.

The world is a weird mix of antiquity and science fiction: Dalucians seem like Romans, Olorum might be a bit Greek, but their gods are definitely technologically advanced with their holograms and transhumanism.

The language of the book is theatrical and reminds me of Russian classics, and not in a good way. The structure mixes the timeline for no apparent reason, and the ending is a complete letdown.

The previous installment of the Gentleman Bastard sequence saw our heroes in high seas, but now it's time to head back to land. Locke and Jean get shanghaied to wreak havoc in Karthain politics, and after some consideration, they take the job.

The [b:The Lies of Locke Lamora|127455|The Lies of Locke Lamora (Gentleman Bastard, #1)|Scott Lynch|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1386924569s/127455.jpg|2116675] was a pure caper story, [b:Red Seas Under Red Skies|887877|Red Seas Under Red Skies (Gentleman Bastard, #2)|Scott Lynch|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1426312779s/887877.jpg|856785] added some adventure to it. This time, there's little time for elaborate scheming. Time and time again Locke and Jean are forced to react, and they scramble to put even some semblance of a plan.

As with previous books, The Republic of Thieves has a side plot situated in the past of the Gentleman Bastards. The main plot and the side plot complement each other, and together, they give the reader more information about Locke. No worries, though - even after this book, he's still a man of mystery. I'm not sure I liked the way his persona was built in this book, though. Usually a magnificently clever master thief, around Sabetha he just drops the ball completely. That happening in the beginning might be understandable, it happening time and again over the years doesn't seem to fit his general persona.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book, maybe more than the previous books. And I can't wait to get my hands on the next one.

Sundiver is the first of David Brin's Uplift novels. Even though it's clearly science fiction, it's in many ways more of a whodunnit detective story than science fiction. The main protagonist, Jacob Demwa, is a regular Sherlock Holmes; he has a reputable background and glorious hero stature, with abilities matching his reputation.

As other reviewers have pointed out, even though Sundiver was written in 1980, it has aged well: there are some mentions of, for example, storage technology, that seem outdated, but on the whole, the technology used by mankind is still mostly science fiction. This is even more true when it comes to alien tech, which is suitably vaguely described to probably remain fresh far into foreseeable future. I was particularly glad to notice this since the last book I read was [book:Foundation|29579][book:Foundation|29579][book:Foundation|29579], which - even if it is a lot older book - was badly hampered by the archaic technology used by supposedly advanced cultures.

Sundiver has interesting ideas, starting from the idea of uplifting itself - and the chain of uplifts that is the basis of the whole galactic culture in the series. Finding life in the Sun is central to the plot, but it's also put on back burner for long stretches, while there's some serious detectivation going on. Jacob is clearly the central figure in the story, and other characters are left even annoyingly shallow.

I enjoyed the book a lot. At the same time, while reading the book, I had a nagging feeling I've read it before. I'm now fairly certain I've read at least most of the book less than ten years ago, but I had only vague recollections that came to my mind while reading it now. Sundiver seems enjoyable, but not memorable.