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This was a fascinating book, probably even better than it's predecessor, Children of Time. There is a lot going on plot-wise, and we do need a few sections of exposition, but otherwise it paints an intriguing tale of contact between civilizations. These new aliens are even more alien than the uplifted spiders and it's very interesting to see the characters struggle through to communicate with them.

For a full review, check out my blog: strakul.blogspot.com/2024/06/book-review-children-of-ruin-by-adrian.html

New York comes alive, through six human avatars, but something in the multiverse isn't happy. Explosively creative & often funny. Shares a deep love for the city & its people. Clever use of identity politics and gentrification.

This was a great book and I see why it has won awards and is generally regarded in a positive light. While the characters are basic, they are nonetheless interesting and the plot is straightforward enough to keep the focus on the setting. The setting is excellent and the way the two societies, one human, one spider, is explored is clever. I enjoyed both viewpoints and wish we had gotten more time after they merged together, but maybe that is a story for the second novel? I look forward to reading the other novels in this series and finding out.

For a full review, check out my blog: strakul.blogspot.com/2024/06/book-review-children-of-time-by-adrian.html

Overall this was a fun read. The world itself is quite dystopian, but the OASIS is incredible. It feels like a very natural evolution of today's online society, for better or worse. Some of the plot can feel a little sluggish with the exposition and the slowdown in the second arc of the book, but it has a good payoff at the end. The characters are OK, but not developed as well as the focus is almost solely on the main character Parzival and his obsession with the 80s, the hunt, and Art3mis. I think the concept behind this (and the nostalgia) was pretty good, though the narrative could have been better, both in terms of characters and plot.

For a full review, check out my blog: strakul.blogspot.com/2024/05/book-review-ready-player-one-by-ernest.html

The final book of the Long Price Quartet. In hindsight, it makes perfect sense the direction this book took, but at the end of the 3rd one I wasn't sure what could come next. Overall a fitting conclusion to the series.

For a spoiler-free review of the full series, check out my blog: strakul.blogspot.com/2024/04/book-review-long-price-quartet-series.html

The 3rd of the 4 books in the Long Price Quartet and my favorite thus far. Lots of complex character interactions going on and the culmination of a lot of plot threads that have been teased in the prior two books. I honestly don't know what the 4th one could be about, if it's not a long epilogue...

This is the second book in the Long Price Quartet and a worthy successor to the first. I'll be holding out for my complete review until I finish the four books, but this was enjoyable on its own. I was surprised by the large time jump between the first and the second, but pleased that many of the same characters reappear. Some similar themes are explored in this one, primarily the nature of relationships and family, though absent are the themes of humanity and slavery. There is a bit more intrigue and politics in this one, something is shaking up and I wonder what the next two books will focus on.