Ten Second Reviews

A Broken Vessel & Whom the Gods Love

By Kate Ross

The second of the Julian Kestrel, regency detective mysteries, I enjoyed this one too. Although there were BY FAR too many clues, that was part of the mystery, and acknowledged by the characters partway through.  It was also entertaining how Kestrel investigated the upper class suspects, his valet Dipper managed the regular tradespeople, and Dipper's prostitute sister Sally handled the underbelly - I thought the use of each of them in their respective spheres was fun.  Kestrel is this time investigating an anonymous note which Sally stole from one of three clients, alluding to a woman in desperate trouble.  She's just died when they find her, and it quickly becomes a murder investigation instead.  Again, some coincidences, but the writing and characters still hold up - I'm checking out the third one as I write.


Aaaaand now I've finished the third, I'm checking out the fourth, and sad that the series will end soon.  Again, far, far too many coincidences (two sets of twins in this one? Not to mention that Kestrel magically lands upon the exact right madhouse by simply wandering around town, ahem) but for whatever reason, I guess I just don't mind them! These feel like dense books, since there's SO MUCH interviewing and discussion, but they're also pleasantly engrossing, especially as the clues start picking up.  I have to say though, these book jackets are driving me crazy, since all the book descriptions give spoilers about the victim and events in the book that don't become really clear until at least halfway through.  I did also guess some of the answers, but was still wholly surprised by the motives, so I'm happy both to be right and to be surprised.  Spoiler here, but I was really put off by the Jewish banker turned rapist subplot.  It felt really out of character and poorly explained how he could actually go through with it, and frankly, left the book on a pretty low note.  But onwards to numero quatro!

Predictably Irrational

By Dan Ariely

Why do our headaches persist after we take a one-cent aspirin but disappear when we take a fifty-cent aspirin? Why do we splurge on a lavish meal but cut coupons to save twenty-five cents on a can of soup?

Dan Ariely refutes the common assumption that we behave in fundamentally rational ways. From drinking coffee to losing weight, from buying a car to choosing a romantic partner, we consistently overpay, underestimate, and procrastinate. Yet these misguided behaviors are neither random nor senseless. They're systematic and predictable—making us predictably irrational.

Soooo, this was fine.  Probably my impression of it is coloured by the fact that I was trying to get my husband interested in it, and it was a complete loss.  I also felt like some of the research was kind of glossed over, in terms of, for example, the chocolate pricing one in the free chapter.  I assume that they controlled for people who came to the table and didn't buy any chocolate when it was 1 and 15 cents respectively but did just pick up a free one, right?  Like, I feel like the total numbers of people getting chocolate had to have gone up (versus those who paid even just one penny) but there isn't really an explanation as to how they covered that, aside from making the sign very small so people had to get close to see it.  But I do find the ideas fascinating, even if more broadly than specifically applicable (like, not everyone is a sucker for advertising) and the chapter on placebos oddly affecting.  Frankly, we should do more experiments with surgery (with knowledge and consent of course) because unnecessarily submitting people to the knife is awful.  But I think the message, that we're all unconsciously doing these things and in some cases, the only cure is to be more conscious, is one that's hit home.

The Winter of the Witch

The Winter of the Witch 

By Katherine Arden 

The Winternight Trilogy introduced an unforgettable heroine, Vasilisa Petrovna, a girl determined to forge her own path in a world that would rather lock her away. Her gifts and her courage have drawn the attention of Morozko, the winter-king, but it is too soon to know if this connection will prove a blessing or a curse.

Now Moscow has been struck by disaster. Its people are searching for answers—and for someone to blame. Vasya finds herself alone, beset on all sides. The Grand Prince is in a rage, choosing allies that will lead him on a path to war and ruin. A wicked demon returns, stronger than ever and determined to spread chaos. Caught at the center of the conflict is Vasya, who finds the fate of two worlds resting on her shoulders. Her destiny uncertain, Vasya will uncover surprising truths about herself and her history as she desperately tries to save Russia, Morozko, and the magical world she treasures. But she may not be able to save them all.

After two duds, I was very glad to get back to Katherine Arden's Winternight Trilogy.  This one was a bit of a freebie, since I had already read - and loved - the first two, I had a pretty good idea I would enjoy this one.  Although sometimes trilogies end in disappointment!  I'm reminded I still have the Tearling trilogy unfinished, because by the time the third came out, I realized I needed to re-read the second as a refresher, and, well, reviews were kinda negative, so I never bothered.  Invasion of the Tearling is still sitting out, waiting for me.  Oops.

Anyway, I have no such ill-news on The Winter of the Witch (which I keep calling the Season of the Witch, because that song is just a perfect earworm).  It's great!  Very boring, I know.  The reviews are a lot easier when you can just bitch for three pages.  Not to say that the book is boring, in fact, it starts off almost immediately with a tragedy, a beheading, and a frantic flight, that give it a feel that you're really jumping straight from the second book to the third without pause.  Literally, since the third is set immediately after the second.  Even after that though, it slows and picks up speed in ways that you don't expect.  There's a big climactic battle that you think would be the finale in another book, but you've got another whole narrative to finish.  [Sidebar: I don't think I reviewed this one here, but another great book that does this is The Library at Mount Char, which really gets you there, gets you wondering what else is there to do, and then pulls a whole other surprise out of its hat.  Another highly recommended read, but not for the faint of heart!]

Not to say that I loved everything about it - I thought the parts where she ends up romantically involved with Morozko were a distraction and unnecessary for her character.  She never seemed to need a romance, and I didn't really want one for her, even though there had been hints that way in earlier books.  Plus, since it has been awhile since I've read the first and second, the whole jewel storyline felt like it was very much built up in the first two books, both as a mystery and a plot point, but it seemed like it kind of fizzled into nothingness in the third.  I just feel like that was oddly unfinished, although maybe I just need to go back and re-read.

I can't help but compare this book to the Waking Lands books (unfairly perhaps) as how to write and plot well versus adequately. For example, in Waking Land, Elanna is beat up enough that she mentions pulling her shirt up and her ribs are black and blue.  Yet two pages later, she's riding a horse and jumping abruptly into the arms of her beloved whatshisname without even a passing thought to it.  In Winter of the Witch, Vasya gets the shit beat out of her, and she feels it for days, for weeks or months (time passes kind of weirdly for a while). It doesn't get forgotten in service of a cliche.

This trilogy as a whole is a wonderful deep dive into Russian folklore and feels like the best kind of fantasy: heavily and painstakingly plotted, not a thing out of place or out of character, and three books long.  Both the Winternight Trilogy and Naomi Novik's newest, Spinning Silver have rapidly replaced Orson Scott Card's Enchantment as my favorite psuedo-Russian fantasy (which definitely has some weird sexual issues that I enjoy less as I get older and wiser). 

This one I originally had down as my 2019 published book, but I'm switching this and Wicked King because I don't know what's in Wicked King but I feel like the domovoi creatures and the Firebird, for sure, better match the:

27: A book featuring an extinct or imaginary creature

White Stallion of Lipizza

White Stallion of Lipizza

By Marguerite Henry

The magnificent white Lipizzan stallions, bred for hundreds of years to dance and delight emperors and kings, captivated Marquerite Henry when she saw them perform in the Spanish Court Riding School in Vienna.

Now she makes this unique spectacle the focal point in her story of Borina, one of the most famous stallions of this famous breed.  It was Borina who, at the height of his career, took a fling in the Viennese Grand Opera.  And it was Borina who, as a mature school stallion, helped train young apprentice riders, and thus became known as the four-footed professor.

One of his pupils was Hans, a baker's boy.  Day after day Hans had watched with longing eyes the parade of Lipizzaners as they crossed the street from their stables to the Palace Riding Hall.  Impossible as it seemed, Hans felt that he must become a part of that world. He must become a Riding Master.  

I was originally struggling with a book for this prompt, since I was trying to steer clear of books I've already read (unless explicitly required) and how would you know whether a book will inspire a certain feeling unless you've already read it?  But in looking over old books, I realized a good Marguerite Henry book would fit just fine - and this one more than most, since it reminds me not only of my horse-reading days, but also of my time in Vienna (even if I do now regret never making time for the Hofreitschule, whomp whomp, although I did get to the opera - which had no horses, but was crazy nonetheless).  Nowadays though, even the Lipizzaners are online for everyone's viewing pleasure, so it's not irredeemable.

My favorite Marguerite Henry book has always been King of the Wind, which may explain some of my predilections for heavy angst and happy endings.  (Although really, once Sham dies, Agba just goes back to Morocco?? After like, twenty years, and while he's mute [and I think mostly illiterate too]? How is he going to get a job again? Why can't he just stay with Sham's kids? Why do I care so much? AND THEY MADE A MOVIE I NEVER KNEW ABOUT UNTIL JUST NOW? And it stars Jenny Agutter? Mind blown!) I barely remember any of her Misty books, but Justin Morgan Had A Horse and Brighty of the Grand Canyon - oh I remember those.  

White Stallion is pretty classic Henry.  It follows a young boy (her protagonists are by historical necessity almost always male, although I do note that two young women were admitted to the Hofreitschule in 2008 for the first time in 436 years of operation, aye yi yi) in Vienna in the late 1930s, early 1940s (and let's unpack that later, shall we?) who dreams of riding Lipizzaners instead of delivering pastries. I mean, who wouldn't? We spend probably 80% of the book focused on him before he is even admitted to the riding school, and just a couple of chapters cover his training and time in the school.  The book is more focused on his dream and his relationship with Borina, who was apparently a real-life famous horse.  Which is how I know when the book was set.  By the way, although Henry obviously wanted to write about horses, there is NO WAY she wouldn't get blasted in reviews for writing a book about a kid in Vienna in 1940 and completely ignore the batshittery going on around him, namely, THE ONSET OF WORLD WAR II.  And yes, we know when this is, because Maestoso Borina was born in 1910, and he is thirty years old in the book. Don't even holler at me.  

I do think that the story of the Lipizzaners during WWII is an interesting one  (and clearly, I'm not alone, since they made a movie about Podhajsky and General Patton saving the Lipizzaners called Miracle of the White Stallion, which now I have to see)  - what place does beauty and art have in Nazi-held Austria, and what does it say about Hans that we know only about riding, and nothing about the terrors going on in the streets? Even the Lipizzaners themselves were caught under the reign (rein?) of the Nazi regime, subject to Nazi stud farms and starving refugees and soldiers.  Perhaps the end note omitting Hans' further activities is for good reason.  

And yet, even so, White Stallion is truly nostalgic, both of a time in history, and of a period in a child's life when you can be consumed wholly by your dream, and achieve it in every measure.  It was a pleasure to discover a Henry book I hadn't read, and the version I had (I don't know if they ever published a normal trade paperback version), which is quite large, with beautiful black and white and color illustrations, was exquisite.

I know this review is chock-full of factota but here's one more to leave you with: Marguerite Henry lived in Wayne, Illinois, which is now kind of a suburb of Chicago, but they did, and still do, host annual Fox Hunts!! Like, for real, they get on horses and chase fake fox smells through the suburban forests.  What the fuck did I just read.  Incredible.


02: Book That Makes You Nostalgic
Jan 5