A few more book reviews
Dec. 30th, 2018 08:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
brigdhStrange Histories: The Trial of the Pig, the Walking Dead, and Other Matters of Fact from the Medieval and Renaissance Worlds by Darren Oldridge. A nonfiction account of various "weird" facts about medieval Europe: that scholars wasted time arguing about how many angels could dance on the head of a pin; that lawyers and judges put animals on trial for murder or for destroying crops; a general belief in vampires, werewolves, and witches; the use of trial by ordeal; and, of course, burning heretics at the stake. Oldridge isn't just interested in listing bizarre incidents though – particularly since most of them are fairly well-known – but in examining the overall worldview that made such activities appear normal, even rational. He points out that it's easy to blame 'ignorant peasants' but in fact it was often highly educated, wealthy, cosmopolitan people who led the charge on such cultural beliefs. So why did they do it? That's what Oldridge sets out to explain.
The writing is humorous, well-researched, and easy to read. Definitely recommended for anyone who enjoys weird history with a thoughtful twist.
Mirage by Somaiya Daud. A sci-fi YA novel, the first in a trilogy. Amani is a teen girl in a poor family from a small farming village, a member of an oppressed people, their world recently conquered by spacefaring outsiders. She's in the middle of her coming-of-age ceremony when she's abducted by the empire's guards. This act at first seems inexplicable, but only until Amani meets Princess Maram, heir to the ruler of the world; the two girls look exactly alike, and Amani is intended to be Maram's body-double in the case of assassination attempts. Amani succeeds in learning to walk, talk, and behave like Maram, but matters are complicated when she meets Maram's fiance, and she and he find themselves falling genuinely in love, unlike his politically motivated betrothal with Maram. A subplot sees Amani agreeing to spy for the very rebels who would like to get rid of Maram, forcing Amani to choose between her family's people and the angry, isolated princess she's beginning to care for.
I was excited for this book. I love reading about court intrigues and behind-the-scenes politicking, and Daud bases her worldbuilding on Moroccan and Islamic mythology, architecture, language, and history, which is a nice change from the usual European-inspired setting. Unfortunately the reality didn't live up to my expectations. There's not really any court intrigues at all, since Amani is too isolated and powerless to influence decisions, and the potentially-fascinating process of her transformation from village girl to princess is mostly skipped over. Instead the majority of the plot is focused on her relationship with Maram's fiance and, sorry, but he's just not that interesting, and their love story is the sort of thing you can find in a thousand other YA novels.
Mirage isn't a bad book, but there's nothing particularly noteworthy about it. I'm not invested enough to want to read the sequels.
I read this as an ARC via NetGalley.
The Sawbones Book: The Hilarious, Horrifying Road to Modern Medicine by Justin and Sydnee McElroy. Sydnee is a family-practice doctor; Justin, her husband, is the oldest of the three McElroy brothers, hosts of numerous and varied comedy podcasts. Together they tell some of the weirdest and grossest stories of medical histories, such as trepanation, resurrection men, the many doctors who deliberately gave themselves various diseases in order to study their transmission, when radium was considered good medicine, and, oh yeah, that time people ate mummies.
It's light, quick, funny history, well-illustrated and with an engaging dialogue between Justin and Sydnee's voices. If you enjoy their podcast, you're surely enjoy the book; if you've never heard of the podcast, the book stands alone as great, if shallow, read.
Unfortunately the first edition of the book is riddled with typos – at least one per page, I'd estimate – as well as several blank pages weirdly glued together at the end. Clearly there was some sort of editing miscommunication or disgruntlement. I've heard more recent printings have dealt with these problems, but alas, I didn't know to check for which edition it was before I bought mine.
The writing is humorous, well-researched, and easy to read. Definitely recommended for anyone who enjoys weird history with a thoughtful twist.
Mirage by Somaiya Daud. A sci-fi YA novel, the first in a trilogy. Amani is a teen girl in a poor family from a small farming village, a member of an oppressed people, their world recently conquered by spacefaring outsiders. She's in the middle of her coming-of-age ceremony when she's abducted by the empire's guards. This act at first seems inexplicable, but only until Amani meets Princess Maram, heir to the ruler of the world; the two girls look exactly alike, and Amani is intended to be Maram's body-double in the case of assassination attempts. Amani succeeds in learning to walk, talk, and behave like Maram, but matters are complicated when she meets Maram's fiance, and she and he find themselves falling genuinely in love, unlike his politically motivated betrothal with Maram. A subplot sees Amani agreeing to spy for the very rebels who would like to get rid of Maram, forcing Amani to choose between her family's people and the angry, isolated princess she's beginning to care for.
I was excited for this book. I love reading about court intrigues and behind-the-scenes politicking, and Daud bases her worldbuilding on Moroccan and Islamic mythology, architecture, language, and history, which is a nice change from the usual European-inspired setting. Unfortunately the reality didn't live up to my expectations. There's not really any court intrigues at all, since Amani is too isolated and powerless to influence decisions, and the potentially-fascinating process of her transformation from village girl to princess is mostly skipped over. Instead the majority of the plot is focused on her relationship with Maram's fiance and, sorry, but he's just not that interesting, and their love story is the sort of thing you can find in a thousand other YA novels.
Mirage isn't a bad book, but there's nothing particularly noteworthy about it. I'm not invested enough to want to read the sequels.
I read this as an ARC via NetGalley.
The Sawbones Book: The Hilarious, Horrifying Road to Modern Medicine by Justin and Sydnee McElroy. Sydnee is a family-practice doctor; Justin, her husband, is the oldest of the three McElroy brothers, hosts of numerous and varied comedy podcasts. Together they tell some of the weirdest and grossest stories of medical histories, such as trepanation, resurrection men, the many doctors who deliberately gave themselves various diseases in order to study their transmission, when radium was considered good medicine, and, oh yeah, that time people ate mummies.
It's light, quick, funny history, well-illustrated and with an engaging dialogue between Justin and Sydnee's voices. If you enjoy their podcast, you're surely enjoy the book; if you've never heard of the podcast, the book stands alone as great, if shallow, read.
Unfortunately the first edition of the book is riddled with typos – at least one per page, I'd estimate – as well as several blank pages weirdly glued together at the end. Clearly there was some sort of editing miscommunication or disgruntlement. I've heard more recent printings have dealt with these problems, but alas, I didn't know to check for which edition it was before I bought mine.
