I enjoyed Yellowface better than Babel, I think because R. F. Kuang was less heavy handed with the points she wanted to make. Perhaps strangely, considering this book is about some pitfalls of publishing and deciding where the line of plagiarism is, it made me want to start writing again. I think that’s because the passion and love for writing really stand out. I was concerned going into this book because I heard the author wanted it to feel like an anxiety attack, but that thankfully wasn’t my experience. If you’re on the fence about R. F. Kuang, I recommend giving Yellowface a try.
The Woman in Me by Britney Spears starts out slow, but around a third of the way in it picks up with Justin Timberlake’s betrayal. Life falls apart for Britney after that as she is used and abused by those who saw dollar signs instead of a person when they looked at her. I cried when Britney thanked her fans for helping free her from the conservatorship. I hope now she gets to have peace surrounded by those who truly love her.
⭐️⭐️⭐️ This one is a bit of a throwback. While it’s a decent read and I’ll continue the series, I don’t think Postmortem by Patricia Cornwell aged well. The ending is rushed and focused on SQL knowledge. It feels like the MC’s niece’s computer skills were the star instead of the MC’s forensic investigative skills.
Swan Dive by Georgina Pazcoguin is a rollicking behind the scenes look at the world of ballet, including one of the top ballet companies in the world, and what it takes to become a soloist there. Georgina includes all the messy details from the injuries to the pranks to the shouting matches, making this autobiography difficult to put down. I came away from this book with massive respect for Georgina’s grit, spunk, and ability to set boundaries. Read by the author, who does an excellent job narrating. A four star read. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
So Let Them Burn by Kamilah Cole is a four star read. It grabbed me from the get go with characters and cultures as vibrant as the cover, and then added dragons and (essentially) mecha! Narrator Keylor Leigh does an excellent job. This was such a fun listen and I look forward to the sequel!
Better late than never! Here’s what I read in February with a brief review for each.
Kingdom of Copper by S. A. Chakraborty
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
If you’re looking for an epic fantasy saga that’s not set in a Eurocentric setting, look no further than the Daevabad trilogy. Kingdom of Copper is the second book in this trilogy and is well narrated by Soneela Nankani.
Tendu: Dancing in the Castle by Ailish Sinclair
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
A light and fun romance set in the ballet world with touches of magic. Do check trigger warnings as it turns into a thriller at the end. Despite the book having trouble sticking to one genre, I enjoyed it.
Cabriole: Dancing in the City by Ailish Sinclair
⭐️⭐️
Unfortunately I cannot say the same for the sequel. It was filled with too much unnecessary drama for me.
The Curse of the Pharaohs by Elizabeth Peters
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
The second book in the Amelia Peabody series is a fun reimagining of The Hound of the Baskervilles in an Egyptian archaeological setting.
Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It by Chris Voss
⭐️⭐️⭐️
Recommended to me by a friend, this book taught me some useful negotiating tactics I’ve used to good effect in real life. I also enjoyed Chris Voss’ stories from his time as an FBI negotiator.
The Mummy Case by Elizabeth Peters
⭐️⭐️⭐️
One of my least favorite Amelia Peabody books because it takes place in England instead of in Egypt. It also features some thoroughly disagreeable children.
Nöthin’ But a Good Time: The Uncensored History of the ‘80s Hard Rock Explosion by Tom Beaujour and Richard Bienstock
✨⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️✨
My first 5 star read for February! A must-read for any fan of ‘80s hard rock, this book is entirely constructed of interviews from the people who were there at the time. You’ll get delicious backstage gossip and come away with great respect for the sheer grit and hard work these musicians put in.
Uncommon Grounds: The History of Coffee and How it Transformed Our World by Mark Pendergrast
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Mark Pendergrast really did the work to research this book, even going to Columbia and picking coffee beans himself. A fascinating and eye opening look at a commodity many can’t do without.
Our Hidden Conversations: What Americans Really Think About Race and Identity by Michele Norris
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
This was fascinating and eye-opening. A very thought-provoking read about Americans’ thoughts on race, based on six word sentences submitted to the author as part of The Race Card Project. A surprisingly rich conversation arises from just six words, though I did find it overly repetitive at times. If I had submitted six words, they would have been, “Celtic pride is not necessarily racist.”
Lion in the Valley and The Deeds of the Disturber by Elizabeth Peters
⭐️⭐️⭐️
Two more installments in the Amelia Peabody series.
Mistborn: The Final Empire by Brandon Sanderson
⭐️⭐️⭐️
The narrator, Michael Kramer, took some getting used to and is a little on the dry and monotonous side. Otherwise I enjoyed this mashup of a classic heist and thief saves the world story with a few twists. I read this book for the February Year in Aeldia 2024 prompt and plan to continue the series next month. I’m in a great buddy read chat for this series and feel like I’ve found friends there. That motivates me to keep going.
Small Town, Big Magic by Hazel Beck
⭐️⭐️⭐️
It’s a romance with magic in and sometimes the plot was moved forward by means of the idiot ball. But I did like it enough I got the sequel on sale and intend to listen to it. Make of that what you will.
Voyage of the Damned by Frances White
✨⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️✨
My second five star read of February! This book features a Murder on the Orient Express-style murder mystery, magic, snark with heart, and gay romance. I am so glad I got a physical copy instead of waiting to find out if there will be an audiobook (which I still devoutly hope will happen with a decent narrator). In this case you can judge a book by its gorgeous cover. I absolutely loved it!
That wraps up my reading for February 2024! Comment below if you’ve read or plan to read any of these books and your thoughts. Hope to see you back here for the next blog post!
I enjoyed this sequel and plan to continue the series, but I gave it 3 stars for 3 reasons:
The plot dragged in places
The main relationship was less spicy
I started wondering what the bad guys were doing for the 1,000 years they weren’t around and the more I thought about it the more cardboard the villains seemed.
I also read this book to fulfill the January prompt for the Magical Readathon: Orilium A Year in Aeldia Reading Challenge 2024. January presented two choices and my character, Vaughn, chose to rely on his wits to get out of a dungeon, which meant reading an audiobook. Who is Vaughn and why was he in a dungeon? Read on to find out!
Vaughn is an electricity elemental known as a Lightning. Physically he is based on Ken Hidaka from the anime Weiß Kreuz. He uses a pair of goggles with magical liquid crystal display lenses and has a gauntlet that turns into any tool he needs and allows him to channel magic. An apprentice Craftsmage, his original goal in attending Orilium University was to make the first magical database, but his extracurricular experiences may be leading him down another path. Vaughn has already obtained keys to the secret alchemy lab and the secret library, and his new goal is to obtain all the keys to the entire university. He’s started carrying a set of magical lock picks at all times. So when his friend Tori wanted to do some urban spelunking to explore the university’s underground, he was all in! They were arrested for trespassing, but Vaughn wasn’t fazed. He just whipped the lock picks out of his shoe and went to work.
I enjoyed Foxglove much more than its predecessor, Belladonna. Foxglove pulled me in from the first with gorgeous, synesthesia-like descriptions of Fate creating and weaving the threads of life. From there it didn’t waste any time becoming a murder mystery. The characters were well fleshed out and their actions were believable. I enjoyed the plot and the ending.
I gave the narration 4 stars because Kristin Atherton speaks very quietly, almost whispering, to make Death and Fate’s voices. While the result is sexy, it’s hard to hear.
Foxglove is the first book I’ve used Book Roast’sCAWPILE system to rate. We’ll see if I stick with it. If you’re unfamiliar with CAWPILE, it’s a spreadsheet that calculates a star rating based on 7 attributes. I’ll explain further and how I’ve modified it in a later post once my friend Ryn finishes some illustrations for me. So far I feel like it calibrates with what I would have rated the book going off gut alone.
A reluctant medium discovers the ties that bind can unleash a dangerous power in this compelling Malaysian-set contemporary fantasy.
When Jessamyn Teoh starts hearing a voice in her head, she chalks it up to stress. Closeted, broke and jobless, she’s moving back to Malaysia with her parents – a country she last saw when she was a toddler.
She soon learns the new voice isn’t even hers, it’s the ghost of her estranged grandmother. In life, Ah Ma was a spirit medium, avatar of a mysterious deity called the Black Water Sister. Now she’s determined to settle a score against a business magnate who has offended the god–and she’s decided Jess is going to help her do it, whether Jess wants to or not.
Drawn into a world of gods, ghosts, and family secrets, Jess finds that making deals with capricious spirits is a dangerous business, but dealing with her grandmother is just as complicated. Especially when Ah Ma tries to spy on her personal life, threatens to spill her secrets to her family and uses her body to commit felonies. As Jess fights for retribution for Ah Ma, she’ll also need to regain control of her body and destiny – or the Black Water Sister may finish her off for good.
Why You Should Listen
~Because Book~
Couldn’t put this one down! If you’ve even thought in passing of checking this one out, DO IT! Jess moves to Malaysia with her parents, only to wind up possessed by her grandmother’s ghost. Ah Ma was the medium for the god Black Water Sister and is determined to have Jess become the god’s next medium so the god can take revenge on a developer who plans to redevelop her temple. Of course Jess, who spent most of her life in the US, has no idea what she’s agreeing to and quickly gets in over her head. To be fair, she does try to bargain with Ah Ma, but knowing the duplicitous nature of many spirits, we were anticipating betrayal. If only Jess had read the Dresden Files! 😂 Jess must figure out who to trust, while juggling complicated family dynamics, cultural expectations, and a secret lesbian romance. Zen Cho does an excellent job balancing insider and outsider cultural perspectives, making this story accessible to any reader. She keeps the twists coming and the ending is unforeseen, powerful, and satisfying.
~Because Narrator~
Catherine Ho does a brilliant job narrating. So brilliant we’re disappointed she’s not narrating Zen Cho’s upcoming short story collection Spirits Abroad. Emily Woo Zeller, who seems to be Audible’s go-to for female Asian narration, was tapped instead. And Zeller is great. But Catherine Ho really gets the potent combination of emotion, magic, and gritty reality in Black Water Sister and brings it all out for the listener. While she does use accents for some characters, it’s never difficult to understand and all the voices are distinct.
The very first sentence was confusing because it ends in a Hokien word. We weren’t expecting that and at first thought we had misheard. Keep going; the word will be explained. This was the only instance where the experience suffered from being audio, simply because we couldn’t tell it was a non-English word and not terrible narration or our hearing by looking at the text.
A Word to the Wise (Content Warnings)
Major: Sexual assault, homophobia, violence, manipulation/gaslighting, religious abuse.
Moderate: Heteronormativity.
Minor: Brief mention of drugs.
TL;DR
This audiobook was an amazing experience and we are looking forward to more from Zen Cho! Do yourself a favor and listen to or read this one!
Bombay, 1921: Perveen Mistry, the daughter of a respected Zoroastrian family, has just joined her father’s law firm, becoming one of the first female lawyers in India. Armed with a legal education from Oxford, Perveen also has a tragic personal history that makes her especially devoted to championing and protecting women’s rights.
Mistry Law is handling the will of Mr. Omar Farid, a wealthy Muslim mill owner who has left three widows behind. But as Perveen goes through the papers, she notices something strange: all three have signed over their inheritance to a charity. What will they live on if they forefeit what their husband left them? Perveen is suspicious.
The Farid widows live in purdah: strict seclusion, never leaving the women’s quarters or speaking to any men. Are they being taken advantage of by an unscrupulous guardian? Perveen tries to investigate and realizes her instincts about the will were correct when tensions escalate to murder. It’s her responsibility to figure out what really happened on Malabar Hill, and to ensure that nobody is in further danger.
The main character, Perveen Mistry, is based on the first female lawyer in India. We really enjoyed watching her use the law to fight for justice where only she can: within a Muslim household’s zenana. We also enjoyed watching her grow as she becomes more competent, takes on new challenges, and learns to work around the constraints society places on her. The characters in the story kept us hooked – for the most part.
Sadly there were some sections where the book started to drag and it felt like we were slogging through the doldrums. We enjoyed the rest of the book so much that it thoroughly aggravates us that Massey chose to include the chapters set in 1917. At first we assumed that there would be a connection between Cyrus, the love interest featured in these chapters, and the murder in 1920. Spoiler: Cyrus is a Chekhov’s gun. We really have no idea why the author thought it was necessary to include him at all. It feels like the 1917 chapters are Massey preaching to the reader about how awful things were for women in Bombay. These chapters should’ve hit the cutting room floor, or at the least been massively condensed. Take our advice and skip the 1917 chapters. It will significantly improve your reading experience.
But we still loved the book enough to read it four out of five stars and buy the sequel. Perveen, her father Jamshadji, and her friend Alice are all characters we definitely want to spend more time with. We also love the vivid pictures Massey paints of life in Bombay with the wide variety of cultures and their clashes with British colonialism. She uses just the right salting of languages like Hindi to add authentic detail without confusing readers who don’t know these terms – especially important in an audiobook when we didn’t know how to spell the non-English words in order to look them up.
The Twitch VODs below are great resources if you’d like to learn more about the history of ancient Persia and Zoroastrianism. They aren’t necessary to enjoy the book, but definitely added to our experience. We had no knowledge of Zoroastrianism before reading this book and as Perveen is Parsi, Zoroastrian customs play a role throughout. We felt better having a basic understanding of the religion as a framework to help mentally organize what we read about in the book. Note that there will be plenty of irreverent nerd humor!
Soneela Nankani does an excellent job of narrating. She gives slightly different accents to characters from different cultures and has a pleasant voice. She never seems to stumble over non-English words. While some reviewers found it difficult to keep track of who is who, we had no trouble tracking who was speaking. While we appreciate the energy Nankani brings to the narration, after a while we noticed that she seems to give every sentence an astonished feeling, which does become annoying. We noticed that Audible switches narrators with the sequel. We usually hate it when they do this, but perhaps Sneha Mathan’s narration will not suffer from the constant astonishment problem.
A Word to the Wise (Content Warnings)
Major: Domestic violence; sexism, misogyny, and colonialism/racism appropriate to the period; toxic family dynamics; manipulation/gaslighting; religious abuse.
We already consider the Asian Readathon a success because we found a new series to love. The Widows of Malabar Hill by Sujata Massey is a book anyone who loves a good cozy legal mystery with a plucky heroine should try. we are already looking forward to book two!
Honeycomb's Hive 