Fiction I've Been Reading Lately #2

Some more short book reviews.

Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik -- 10/10. Naomi Novik continues to create beautiful fantasy worlds, supported by rich detail from historical and real-world cultures, and characters with depth and charm who change in fascinating ways. In Spinning Silver, the protagonist is a young Jewish woman who makes her own way through the fantasy plot that's been assigned to her. Highly recommended. And you should read everything else she's written, too.

(Come to think of it, I haven't tracked down her work on AO3, but she must have some, being a founder of the site...)

Impossible Things by Connie Willis -- 7/10. After reading a few of Willis's other books, I've concluded that her most distinctive talent as an author is writing conversations in which a woman is trying desperately to convey the deep truth of her experience to someone else, and the other person is completely talking past her because they have some irritating, shallow aim in mind and care exactly zero about her. Or better yet, the woman has completely given up on trying to express what she cares about and just lies like hell to get out of every terrible life situation she is in, without ever once telling someone else things like "We need a divorce" or "Actually, my name is 'Chris.'"

But in general, she writes great characters, even though sometimes her irritating comic-relief characters are a little much for me.  These short stories are fun to read. I particularly liked the first one, which is set in a near-future sci-fi universe without dogs.

The Atlantis Gene by A.G. Riddle -- 7/10. Fast-paced thriller, with interesting pseudoscience. The first book is a lot more fun to read than the following two. In the first book, the author does a great job of making it feel like the action is so intense that you must be near the end, throughout the entire book; the other two are a little less so.

The gender dynamics in this book were not actively objectionable, but fell into a common pattern that I find tiresome.

Three Body Problem by Cixin Liu -- 7/10. Interesting; fascinatingly alien as a read for me as a Westerner. This book helped me realize how deeply ignorant I am of Chinese culture. The writing quality is solid. There's a certain part involving the cosmic microwave background that's incredibly haunting (it's in excerpts you can find online); unfortunately, I didn't quite feel that the rest of the book delivered on the mysteries that it promised. The science got less "hard" and more handwavey towards the end.

I may or may not read the sequels, since I have heard that they are much worse (especially on the gender axis).