Reading Wednesday

[cinaed]

 Or Thursday, because days of the week are hard.

Recently Finished

 

Still chipping away at my pile of library books, which means I read Downbelow Station by C.J. Cherryh, The Mortal Word by Genevieve Cogman, and A Princess in Theory by Alyssa Cole. 

 

Downbelow Station is the start of a space opera series chock full of complicated politics, people trying their best with bad information or bad situations, cool aliens, and landed me with an OT3. The first chapter was a bit rough to get things up, but I loved how Cherryh threw like twenty characters and fifteen plots at me and it all felt cohesive and easy to follow. Unfortunately my library doesn't have the rest of the series and most of her books don't seem to be available via ebooks, so I'm sad about not getting to read the rest.

The Mortal Word is the latest book in Genevieve Cogman's Invisible Library series. This series is great, and this one was no exception, with more intrigue within the Library and outside as Irene is forced to solve a murder during a secret peace talk conference between the Fae and the dragons. I was a little sad that we got to see Bradamante and then she vanished after a few chapters, because my one complaint for this series is that Irene needs more female friends, but the book was still a very fun read and had some interesting set-up for future books.  

A Princess in Theory is the first book in Alyssa Cole's Reluctant Royals series, which is essentially taking popular romance tropes and letting black women be the main character instead of a white woman. I've read one of Cole's historical romances in the past and enjoyed it a lot, but for this book I wanted to like it more than I did. I loved Naledi, a worn-down grad student who's trying to study infectious disease and keep herself together after aging out of the fostercare system, who begins receiving clearly scam letters from a person who tells her she is the long-lost betrothed of a prince of a small African nation, only to discover that person was telling the truth. But I never got attached to the love interest and the rest of the plot -- Naledi reuiniting with her lost family and solving a mysterious illness in her new homeland -- felt very rushed. 
 

Currently Reading

 

I'm about one-third of the way through Stuntwomen: The Untold Hollywood Story by Mollie Gregory, which is a history of stuntwomen in Hollywood from the silent era until now. It's an interesting but tough read -- so much discrimination, unsafe stunts, sexual harassment, pretty much everything you'd worry about. I wish Gregory would go into some more details at times. She drops a "three stuntwomen died" fact and then doesn't follow it up. That said, I'm fascinated. 
 

What's Next

Well, The edge of anarchy : the railroad barons, the Gilded Age, and the greatest labor uprising in America has a hold on it and it's due this week, so I guess I'm reading that one next so the person waiting for it doesn't wait longer! 

Comments

[ambyr]

Huh. I would not have described Downbelow Station as the start of the series, FWIW, though I know it's the earliest written volume in what you might describe as the main series thread. I'm glad it's working for you as a starting point, anyway! If you want to keep reading, Heavy Time and Hellburner are both available in ebook through Cherryh's website, and most of the rest of the series is in Kindle in various omnibus editions--Alliance Space, The Deep Beyond, and Alternate Realities. (The Chanur books are also part of that universe and available on Kindle as single volumes.) All of which are available for purchase through Overdrive, so I guess I should go hit the Recommend button a lot.

Cyteen is one volume that's notably not available in ebook, to my eternal frustration. But I do have a paper copy if you ever want to borrow it.

[cinaed]

...So what I'm hearing is that going off her bibliography on Wikipedia steered me wrong on which book to read first. And looking at her website is leaving me even more confused, whoops! I definitely want to read more in that universe, but I also want to read more about Elene/Damon/Josh if they're in any other books.

Thanks for listing them out! I should probably read some of my already purchased ebooks before making any more, but I'm definitely saving this list for later. :D And I'll probably take you up on Cyteen at some point.

Found this on Goodreads, does this look like a reasonable reading order?

https://www.goodreads.com/series/56549-alliance-union-universe

[ambyr]

That's a weirdly incomplete list--I don't think most people would include the Faded Sun side series but not the Chanur side series. The list at https://alliance-union.fandom.com/wiki/Alliance-Union looks complete (except that it's missing the most recent book, Alliance Rising), and there's a sort of internal chronology timeline at http://www.solstation.com/cherryh/ref/timeline.html (though it's missing many later books, and also full of spoilers). Anyway, I think Cherryh is right that they can be read in almost any order (but don't read Regenesis before Cyteen, it will have no emotional resonance at all--I mention this because Regenesis seems to be one the few DCPL has). I have not myself read all of them!

I don't think Elene, Damon, and Josh ever show up again, but Signy Mallory is a significant character in one later book.

[chestnut_pod]

With you regarding A Princess in Theory - I thought the second book in that series was better than the first (I found the main protagonist very sympathetic and the conceit rather fun), and that her historicals are better than either.

[skygiants]

Broadly agreed on both counts! with the exception of the fact that the 2.5th princess book (the novella with lesbians) is my second-favorite thing she's written.