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the truth matters
Today's January Journal topic comes from ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
chelseagirl: books. What are some favorites from this year? And has the pandemic affected your reading practice?
The pandemic tanked my book-reading for 2020. Most of my book-reading time is on my commute and during my lunch hour at work, and once I stopped commuting, I stopped reading books, for the most part. I only ended up reading about 45 books in 2020, which is about half of what I usually manage. It just seemed easier to read fic or news since I didn't have a dedicated time every day without stable wifi.
I did read some excellent books last year, including the final two books of The Daevabad Trilogy, which just kept getting better and better as it went on, which is not a thing I've found happens a lot with trilogies or series. It begins in 19th c. Cairo and then travels to the hidden Djinn city of Daevabad (I guess it is kind of a portal fantasy), with the thief and con artist (and unlicensed medical practitioner) Nahri getting swept up in the city's political (religious and ethnic) struggles.
I also thought Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky was a great read, though less in an emotional-investment way and more in an impressive plot and world-building way, and I even managed to forget for a few minutes at a time that it is about uplifted SPIDERS as they evolve their society.
The new translation of Beowulf by Maria Dhavana Headley was excellent, though I freely admit I haven't read any other translations, and that this is definitely either a love it or hate it kind of thing, given how Headley uses modern language and slang to make the poetry come to life. Will it be dated in a few year? Probably. Did I care while I was reading? Nope. It was also excellent for reading out loud.
Return of the Thief, the final book of The Queen's Thief series by Megan Whalen Turner, is definitely worth mentioning - a very satisfying conclusion to a series I love a lot (and reread leading up to it, which definitely helped in remembering who was who; it also helped me appreciate A Conspiracy of Kings more as when I first read it, it had been a few years since I'd read the earlier books and I wasn't sure who was who; it also gave me a greater appreciation for Sophos).
I also enjoyed the two Avatar Kyoshi novels by FC Yee, which felt like the Avatar world and provided backstory and detail on a towering figure from the original series.
That's probably my top 5 books of 2020.
***
I did a little editing and put up the ficlet I posted yesterday on AO3:
The Hardest Part
Avengers; Natasha; g; 717 words
Natasha knows how to wait.
***
chelseagirl: books. What are some favorites from this year? And has the pandemic affected your reading practice?The pandemic tanked my book-reading for 2020. Most of my book-reading time is on my commute and during my lunch hour at work, and once I stopped commuting, I stopped reading books, for the most part. I only ended up reading about 45 books in 2020, which is about half of what I usually manage. It just seemed easier to read fic or news since I didn't have a dedicated time every day without stable wifi.
I did read some excellent books last year, including the final two books of The Daevabad Trilogy, which just kept getting better and better as it went on, which is not a thing I've found happens a lot with trilogies or series. It begins in 19th c. Cairo and then travels to the hidden Djinn city of Daevabad (I guess it is kind of a portal fantasy), with the thief and con artist (and unlicensed medical practitioner) Nahri getting swept up in the city's political (religious and ethnic) struggles.
I also thought Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky was a great read, though less in an emotional-investment way and more in an impressive plot and world-building way, and I even managed to forget for a few minutes at a time that it is about uplifted SPIDERS as they evolve their society.
The new translation of Beowulf by Maria Dhavana Headley was excellent, though I freely admit I haven't read any other translations, and that this is definitely either a love it or hate it kind of thing, given how Headley uses modern language and slang to make the poetry come to life. Will it be dated in a few year? Probably. Did I care while I was reading? Nope. It was also excellent for reading out loud.
Return of the Thief, the final book of The Queen's Thief series by Megan Whalen Turner, is definitely worth mentioning - a very satisfying conclusion to a series I love a lot (and reread leading up to it, which definitely helped in remembering who was who; it also helped me appreciate A Conspiracy of Kings more as when I first read it, it had been a few years since I'd read the earlier books and I wasn't sure who was who; it also gave me a greater appreciation for Sophos).
I also enjoyed the two Avatar Kyoshi novels by FC Yee, which felt like the Avatar world and provided backstory and detail on a towering figure from the original series.
That's probably my top 5 books of 2020.
***
I did a little editing and put up the ficlet I posted yesterday on AO3:
The Hardest Part
Avengers; Natasha; g; 717 words
Natasha knows how to wait.
***
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I read the first Daevabad book as a buddy read with a friend; I should pick the rest up.
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I also really enjoyed the Daevabad trilogy, and I loved Children of Time. I was nervous about the sequel, but I enjoyed it as much if not more. (And he's writing a third book!)
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I want to read the Children of Time sequel but I have not been able to focus much on reading anything so far in 2021.