Review: Ark

November 21, 2019November 21, 2019 DeAnne1 Comment

On the eve of Earth’s destruction, a young scientist discovers something too precious to lose, in a story of cataclysm and hope by the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Divergent trilogy.

It’s only two weeks before an asteroid turns home to dust. Though most of Earth has already been evacuated, it’s Samantha’s job to catalog plant samples for the survivors’ unknowable journey beyond.

Preparing to stay behind and watch the world end, she makes a final human connection. As certain doom hurtles nearer, the unexpected and beautiful potential for the future begins to flower.

Ark is another installment in Amazon’s Forward series where we’re facing the end of earth. In this one, a asteroid is about to hit earth and destroy life as we know it. Those that are left on earth are scientists who are frantically working to catalog as much flora and fauna as they can before they leave a couple days before it hits.

Since this is a really short story I’m not going to say much about it because pretty much anything would be a spoiler, but this is an interesting perspective on the different decisions people may make if they know the world is ending. The main character we follow is Samantha, whose perspective and feelings change based on things she discovers and people she talks to.

It’s a great look at what different people may do when facing the destruction of everything they know. I’m eager to read the rest of the collection and see what other stories these authors have come up with.

Happy reading!

Review: Summer Frost

November 15, 2019November 15, 2019 DeAnne1 Comment

A video game developer becomes obsessed with a willful character in her new project, in a mind-bending exploration of what it means to be human by the New York Times bestselling author of Recursion.

Maxine was made to do one thing: die. Except the minor non-player character in the world Riley is building makes her own impossible decision—veering wildly off course and exploring the boundaries of the map. When the curious Riley extracts her code for closer examination, an emotional relationship develops between them. Soon Riley has all new plans for her spontaneous AI, including bringing Max into the real world. But what if Max has real-world plans of her own?

Overall I really enjoyed this novella that is an interesting spin on the trope of AI becoming too sentient and evolved and wreaking havoc while they try to take over. It’s a constantly debated question as to how smart is too smart for technology.

This story follows Riley, a programmer and Max and AI that was originally an NPC in a video game that somehow changed the game and became their own entity. Riley is obsessed and constantly testing how Max can learn and just how much they can evolve. Her obsession is dangerous and drastically changes her life.

Part of me feels as if this could have been longer, but the rest of me feels it was the perfect length. It was a short, succinct tale that is cautionary in a lot of ways. Could the characters have had more backstory and development? Absolutely, but they didn’t necessarily always need it.

Even though it is short, Blake Crouch’s signature twists and turns are still there and there were definitely a few that kept me guessing. If you like his writing you will probably really enjoy this as well.

Happy reading!

Anthology Appreciation

September 2, 2018September 2, 2018 DeAnneLeave a comment

Not everyone enjoys anthologies, but they are some of my favorites. I’ve always been a lover of the short story and that love was fostered by some teachers who also thought they were a great medium. In some ways they can be more difficult to write as they must be much more concise and concentrated than a full length novel. In this post I’m going to talk about a few I’ve recently read as well as some of my favorites. All pictures of the covers will be linked to the book’s Amazon page so that you can pick them up if you want to.

Recently I was given the opportunity through NetGalley to read two anthologies which recently came out. They were very different genres and subjects, but I thoroughly enjoyed both of them.

Toil and Trouble: 15 Tales of Women and Witchcraft, which was edited by Tess Sharpe and Jessica Spotswood, included stories that represented a number of cultures, mythologies and genres. My detailed review of each story is on my Goodreads so I won’t rehash that here, but I can say that while there were some stories I didn’t enjoy as much as others it was an enjoyable read. It would be perfect for reading not only around Halloween, but anytime during the year.

The other anthology I received on NetGalley was Fresh Ink, which was done in partnership with We Need Diverse Books. Having already read Flying Lessons, I was super excited to be able to read this one ahead of time. I wish there were more anthologies like these two as they explore topics and situations that often need to be explored and discussed by wider audiences. Again, I didn’t love every story in this anthology, but it exposed me to a number of authors I had not previously read. That’s another great thing about anthologies, you get to read stories from so many authors who you often may not have read from before.

I have a number of anthologies on my bookshelves, so picking out favorites is not always an easy task. I have anthologies in different genres and with different subject matter, but I’ve chosen a few that I really loved when I read them. My True Love Gave to Me and Summer Days & Summer Nights are collections which were edited by Stephanie Perkins. One has love stories based in the winter while the other is set during the summer (bonus, the story in Summer Days & Summer Nights by Perkins is a continuation of the story she wrote for My True Love Gave to Me and I LOVED them both).

Slasher Girls and Monster Boys and Unnatural Creatures both tackle darker subjects and were both amazing. They are perfect to read closer to Halloween and each have a spooky vibe that I enjoyed immensely. There are some stories in them which are definitely not for the faint of heart. I especially loved that Unnatural Creatures was edited by Neil Gaiman. A lot of the stories in these two anthologies had great twists and were very addictive.

Meet Cute is an anthology purely about the initial interactions between characters that lead to a romance, or the “Meet Cute.” There are some stories in this one that are absolutely amazing and each one leaves you wanting more, but in a good way.