Cue the music. #SciFiMonth
1 like
Liked this one but failed to find it funny. More heartbreaking than funny.
Space Opera | 
pickLiked this one but failed to find it funny. More heartbreaking than funny.
panJust finished. Hate to say it but I really didn't care for this book. Some have compared it to hitchhikers guide to the galaxy. I can see that but i still wouldn't recommend it. 👎
So far I'm not loving this book. The words are just words and are failing to create an image/world for me to enter. I'm not calling the #dnf yet but so far 🌟.
pickIf you hate to laugh and think humanity is great, do NOT read this #hugo2019 nominated book. If you want a story about Galactic music concert reality show being the only way to save Earth that is full of humanity-depreciating jokes and brilliantly diverse aliens, read this book. The photo is of the Flaming Lips‘ Wayne Coyne. Thank you Catherynne M Valente....Thank you.
"Aquatic species have a notoriously tough time handling the usual technological transition from ruining their own planets to ruining whole solar systems. While mammals, insects, and enlightened lichen can zip about as long as they take along a few houseplants to micromanage the air cycle, the unlucky space whales of this universe have to sort out how to get a ship overburdened with the absurd weight of a personal ocean into high orbit. ⤵️
The #bookfairies all arrived at my house today with surprise litsy love packages from @OriginalCyn620 AND @Soubhiville filed with these gems and I'm so excited! Thank you both!!
#litsylove
I've only been able to read 4 hours and 40 minutes so far for the #24B4Monday readathon, but I did finish my last book from the 2019 Hugo Best Novel shortlist. This one is a lot of fun, in the style of Douglas Adams.
#hugo2019
@jb72 @Andrew65 @TheReadingMermaid
pickWhen I read the blurb for this book, I expected a fun, over-the-top, absurd, & silly story. And that‘s what this is. I laughed throughout this book! Simply put, it‘s a wild, fantastical ride! A singing competition held in space determines which species lives or dies. Eurovision meets Hitchhiker‘s Guide To The Galaxy.
#booked2019 #bookgiftedtoyou #popsugarreadingchallenge
Finished. Two more to go so that I can vote for #hugo2019 best novel. I liked this one...but feel like I‘d need to read a few more times to get everything out of it.
I‘m about 100 pages in and I can see how this would not be a lot of people‘s cup of tea. I, however, am laughing my a** off! #saturdaymood
One of my favorite first sentences in a very long time! 4th out of 6 books I need to complete to vote in #hugo2019
pan? This just wasn‘t my cup of tea at all:
Absurdist comedy á la Douglas Adams that just wore on you; long/boring exposition (hours and hours of rambling on and on about nothing that mattered in the end,) not enough action, and a narrator that sounded so pretentious that he sounded like a *parody* of a British narrator (He just earned a spot on my “NO List!)
🎧 This is an absurdist comedy about an intergalactic Eurovision-type competition in which the prize for not coming in last means that your planet and sentient species gets to live...
A third of the way in, I‘m committed to the audiobook (narrated by Heath Miller,) but the “cleverness” and slow plot drive are wearing on me a bit.
panI knew going in that I don‘t enjoy Eurovision and I no longer enjoy Douglas Adams, so this was going to be a tough pitch. Hats off to Valente for imagination and prose powers - but ultimately, not my thing. I enjoyed the first third but by midway the over the top writing and emphasis on glam galaxy building over plot or character exhausted my interest and my patience.
...but if I loved Eurovision and comic SF? Genius, surely.
"Is that really it?" Dess interrupted halfway through. "We just sing better than one beastie and we get to live?"
"Yes. Does it seem barbaric to you? Sixty-seven percent of your population used that word."
"No, it makes sense to me. It's perfect."
"Why?"
Decibel shrugged. "Life is stupid and beautiful in that way."
...I‘m not loving this book, but I could love this philosophy. Shine on, baby.
pickThis book was absurd in the best possible way. I tried to read it twice before getting the audiobook from Libby - that was DEFINITELY the way to go for me. I didn‘t get as caught up in the words and was able to appreciate the feel of the book - a weird, crazy romp from London to the edge of the galaxy, with descriptions of alien biology, home worlds, and artistic proclivities spelled out in funktastic descriptions. My 2nd audiobook for #BFC.🤘🏻
so-soI've been looking forward to this for ages. It was a little too frenetic/insubstantial for me right now. Real life is so crazy-busy at the moment, I don't need that in my entertainment, too. Right now, I just need nice/fluffy/kind/easy/pleasant/light. It reminded me a bit of the frenetic The Everything Box, by Richard Kadrey [maybe also of The Long Earth, by Terry Pratchett (but not as good)]. The cover is pretty, though. 😉
bailedUnfortunately, I got about halfway through this and figured out it just wasn‘t for me. Too much nonsense, not enough story.
The shortest of my library books, I‘m going to see how this one goes. It sounds absolutely outrageous and fun.
bailedI am so conflicted.
I adore Catherynne Valente. She is one of my do-not-read-reviews-just-immediately-begin-the-book authors. Her style and verbiage and aesthetic are totally my thing.
BUT. I just can't with this book right now. Yes, I am in a reading slump. Yes, I am having trouble with focus. But no, this is too much. The prose is just too pleased with itself. This is so Douglas Adams that I miss what I loved most about Catherynne Valente.
#bookhaul 🎉🎉
I spent my Amazon gift card gift from @TheSpineView this week! Space Opera is definitely a #blamelitsy purchase, and the Haunted House create-a-story kit has been on my list for a while, as a fun family activity to do during my recovery period. When I saw it at a super-low price, I grabbed it! Thanks again, @TheSpineView !!
panLoved the premise of this book, but i found it to be overly verbose. Sentences are monster-long with detailed passages that are imaginative, a bit psychedelic and definitely meandering. i stopped and started this book multiple times. But since i hate to DNF a book, finally powered through. Not really my cup of tea, though i can see the appeal for those who can appreciate the frenetic and tangential pace of this story.
Some books that are #outofthisworld! #springintoreading
I wanted to share all the gorgeous stars. I adore these bookmarks, this book sleeve, and the magnets! It‘s all just so perfect. @Chrissyreadit I can‘t put into words how much this exchange of both books and friendship has meant to me. Thank you 💙
#SFFS 4/4 #SciFiFantasySwap @Avanders
Chrissy, I can‘t thank you enough for this package!!! From the bottom of my heart, thank you. Your thoughtfulness is incredible. I am going to start reading immediately! I think I‘ll start with Hitchhiker‘s Guide, or maybe Written in Red?! I could use a great escape right about now. Get ready for some close-ups!
#SFFS 1/4 #ScienceFictionFantasySwap
panWTF did I listen to?? I LOVED the narrator he made this bat shit crazy book a total blast but the story was wayyyyy too bonkers for me. Listened on audio during my 9.5 hour flight, I may have dozed off for awhile. #Pop19 #SetInSpace 👽🎵🚀 It‘s still a Pan for me though. #StarScrooge ( are you happy @Reviewsbylola ?!??!)
This book is intergalactic cray-cray but the audio narrator is flat out hilarious 😂I‘ve been listening on/off the past few days. Using for #Pop19 #SetInSpace
panJust nooot my thing -- the humour is too directly taken from Douglas Adams, and Valente's usual exuberance of language is not kept under any bounds.
Then again, I don't enjoy Eurovision either, so I may just be entirely the wrong audience.
panI think perhaps Valente's work just isn't for me (though Radiance is the only other book of hers I've read). The prose was very... intense in tone, and it felt exhausting to read. I enjoyed a couple of scenes, but the plot felt beside the point sometimes. I appreciate what she was trying to do, but the execution was overall not enjoyable. As I said to a friend: "like if reading Douglas Adams were instead a dental procedure."
bailedI wanted to like this so badly! I loved her Refrigerator Monologues, I always liked Hitchhiker‘s Guide, and Eurovision in space sounded like a dream pitch. But this was just.... totally overwritten, boring, and a little full of itself. I would‘ve loved the basic boiled down essence of this as a short story but as a novel it‘s just Too Much, and not in a good way.
bailedReally, it's not you. It's me. If it weren't for this reading slump I am in, maybe I would find your endless world-building ingenious or witty! But after 4 hours of this audio book, nothing really has happened, and I am giving up...
so-soListened to this on audiobook. The narration was great, but the story/characters just meh.
#TimbitTunes #StarBoy I‘m sure this book is going to be total cheese fest but I‘m looking forward To Eurovision in space 🎶🎧💫🌏🌟Making progress on my library hold...It‘s nearly 3 months and I was number 9 now I‘m number 3 on the holds list✨
Just started this one to annotate and send to my friend Trinity. I was JUST thinking that I wanted a book that felt a bit like a musical wine @everlocalwest recommended this one and I was hooked. I‘m excited to get started and see what Trinity has to say when I send it to her later this month!
The galaxy nearly roasted itself to ashes over the question of which species were and were not sentient... And quite frankly, Mr. Rogers notwithstanding, you're a mess.
so-so5 stars for style and concept. Eurovision in Space. Yes. It scratches all the HHGTTG itches. Also for including one of the most dunked-on tech things from the 90s (but it‘s a bit of a spoiler, so, sorry).
But man, the digressions into the world-building are uninteresting, the “aliens” almost universally detestable with exceptions of The Roadrunner and the Keshett, and the main characters of Dec and Oort bafflingly uninteresting/weirdly preachy.
Di you have enough goodness in the world to let the music play? Do you have soul?
I don't want to spoil the surprise but this hilarious satire just KILLED me with this bit involving Microsoft Word. 😹😹😹😹😹😹Nothing will ever be that funny again, the end.
Can I just sit here and bathe in this glorious prose all day instead of going to work?
so-soA book read in 2018:
Valente channels the ghost of Douglas Adams for this romp in which an intergalactic singing contest determines the fate of humanity. The story here is really more of an excuse for an elaborate and sometimes funny exercise involving a lot of strange concepts & aliens. Clearly, she had fun writing it, but with so many tangents & concepts the flow & the story get a bit lost and muddled. Enjoyable but not great.
I never thought being overstimulated by a book would make me love it so much.
