Laura LamReseñas

Got more fantasy in this book, Chosen One(s) and prophecies and the end of the world and all, and I correspondingly enjoyed it less. Still going to try the third, because I did buy it and I want to see it through, but then I'm probably going to offload all three.

Read #2, October 2023: Pretty much the same feelings as first time. Obviously I didn't get the second (or third) at the time, but I'm looking to fix that by the power of eBay. It feels like much longer ago than 2015 that I last read this, but I guess 2015 was a long time ago (!?).

*

Read #1:

This contains mild spoilers, but only if you have absolutely no idea how Micah and Iphigenia are connected, and it's not hard to guess.

I liked Pantomime so much, but the end was hard to read. I'm still not totally decided about whether the violence was shocking because it really did come out of nowhere or because it was in keeping with the rest of the book and I was shocked because I cared so much about the characters. The scene where Micah for some reason decides that the only way he can explain his condition quickly is to take off all his clothes was honestly as hard to read for me as the deaths.

I just gave up on The Other YA Fantasy Novel With Trans Characters, [book:Eon: Dragoneye Reborn|2986865], and I was thinking that the main problem I had with it was that it was all about magic and I don't really read fantasy anymore. That's not quite true, though---Pantomime is fantasy (albeit with a steampunk edge), and I really enjoyed the fantasy elements.

It would be hard to overstate how great the LGBTI representation is in this book. Laura Lam did an awesome job, y'all. Micah wonders at one point if he likes Aenea in a straight way or a gay way. Just...

Not bad, interesting main character, but I thought it was a bit slow.

Rather disappointing - neither the SF nor the crime elements work well for me. An OK popcorn read, but doesn't make me want to rush out and buy the next one.½

This book was not quite what I hoped for unfortunately. I was excited about this with all the hype and the fact that it has dragons in it, but this book simply wasn't for me. This isn't my kind of book. I had a hard time with some of the way the POVs of the characters switched during the story and was lost as to which character was talking some of the time. I also felt like they were trying to break the fourth wall during part of the story and it felt weird and I didn't like it. Whether they meant to break/try to break the fourth wall on purpose or not I don't know, but in this kind of story it didn't work the way they were doing it/trying to do it.
I'm sure that a lot of others will like and enjoy this story and follow the series simply because it has dragons in it. I personally expected something different because it had dragons in it. I know this will be something a lot of others like and that there are a lot who do like it already. I simply wasn't the audience for this and it's not for me.
Thanks to NetGalley and DAW books for letting me have a chance to read and review this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

This book was not quite what I hoped for unfortunately. I was excited about this with all the hype and the fact that it has dragons in it, but this book simply wasn't for me. This isn't my kind of book. I had a hard time with some of the way the POVs of the characters switched during the story and was lost as to which character was talking some of the time. I also felt like they were trying to break the fourth wall during part of the story and it felt weird and I didn't like it. Whether they meant to break/try to break the fourth wall on purpose or not I don't know, but in this kind of story it didn't work the way they were doing it/trying to do it.
I'm sure that a lot of others will like and enjoy this story and follow the series simply because it has dragons in it. I personally expected something different because it had dragons in it. I know this will be something a lot of others like and that there are a lot who do like it already. I simply wasn't the audience for this and it's not for me.
Thanks to NetGalley and DAW books for letting me have a chance to read and review this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

I like dragons.
This book was easy to read but I don’t understand why each POV was written differently (1st, 2nd and 3rd).
I found Sorins chapters the most boring.
I liked the romance but there wasn’t enough of it for a story that centres on a bond between a human and dragon.
In terms of the magic system, I’m still confused.
I enjoyed it but don’t feel the need to continue with the series.

Originally posted on Just Geeking by.

Content warnings:
This book contains scenes of violence, murder and death, including mass murder in the form of a plague. Events from the plague are discussed throughout the book in detail. In some flashback scenes, a sick room and the death of a parent are described in detail. As a result of the plague, characters can become starved for magic and there are scenes of a cannibalistic nature.

There are scenes of bigotry, classism and ableism, with victims of the plague afflicted with long-term complications being ostracised. There is a manipulative, abusive relationship with religious ties between a young person and the mentor who rescued them when they were a child.

Additionally, parts of dragons are traded as religious relics.

In Dragonfall by L.R. Lam, a young thief ends up accidentally forming a bond with a dragon. There were many elements of this book that I enjoyed, such as the world-building and the unusual narrative choice of one using first person for Everen and third person for Arcady. However, the pace was just far too slow for me. Arcady is preparing for one last heist to set them up for the life they want when Everen quite literally falls into their life. As they’re stuck with him and Everen is new to town, Arcady takes the initiative, asking Everen to join them for their heist. Most of the book is taken up with Arcady teaching Everen in excruciatingly slow detail how to be a thief. While their relationship develops as alongside his training, Dragonfall is the slowest of slow burns, and it was just too slow for me.

As for the heist itself, I have mixed feelings about it. Lam weaves everything together by the end of the book, and the last twenty percent of the book is brilliant. Yet I can’t shake the feeling that in recent years there’s been an increase in heist fantasy novels, and I’m not sure that this one really needed to be one. There’s enough going on with Everen and Arcady’s storyline, as well as other sub-plots, that this just felt like a bit too much.

Despite not enjoying the way in which Lam has chosen to tell her story, I thoroughly enjoyed the unique world she created. She has created an interesting queer normative world where humans view dragons as gods, completely unaware of the true events of history or that dragons once lived alongside them. The amount of detail that Lam has gone into while creating the dragon species for Dragonfall is fascinating, and her descriptions are gorgeous.

As everything comes neatly together at the end of the novel, Dragonfall proves to be an interesting start to a new series. It just, as I said, took so long to get there. While I think it was worth it in the end, it personally wasn’t my preferred type of book. The book ends on a cliffhanger, which sets up very nicely for the next book. As a result, my attention has been caught enough to ensure I’ll be checking out book two to see what happens next.

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Pros: interesting characters, great worldbuilding, non-binary protagonist

Cons:

Arcady Eremia wants to clear their family’s name, so they need money and a new last name. Their spell was only supposed to change their name seal, not pull someone into their world. Certainly not someone magically bonded to them.

Everen Emberclaw’s been given a chance to fulfill a prophecy to save dragonkind from their dying world. But to do it he must properly bond with Arcady and then kill them.

This is a story about trust between two broken people that involves a fun heist towards the end of the book.

The worldbuilding was excellent. The human world has a fair amount of variety, with several kingdoms that have different customs, and a religion centered on the worship of dragons.

Arcady is non-binary and the world has a nifty way of dealing with pronouns, using honourifics until you learn the correct forms of address.

There are light romance elements with a fun will they/won’t they aspect.

Arcady’s gruff and a bit unlikeable at first, but really grows on you as time goes on. I loved Everen completely, especially watching him learn about the human world and trying to fit in.

Giving dragons feathers was kind of unique, and I loved that they have a smaller -preterit- forms.

This is the first of a series so while it ties up some loose ends it’s only part of a larger story.

This was a lot of gay scifi fun. It definitely hit all my fave tropes in pretty enjoyable ways.

Really enjoyed this sequel to [b:Seven Devils|38822981|Seven Devils (Seven Devils #1)|Laura Lam|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1573632170l/38822981._SY75_.jpg|60397353]. It repeated the quick pace and all the fun sci-fi/fantasy from the first book with a solid, satisfying ending.

I liked the rapidly changing perspectives and short chapters; it made the book flow by quickly. The characters were all compelling in different ways as well.

Just a fun found-family space adventure.

I went into this book with no expectations so I was very pleasantly surprised. The beginning of the book starts off in a fairly standard science fiction way: futuristic San Francisco where everyone has biotic implants to make life and learning easier, virtual reality dreaming is all the craze and there is virtually no crime. There's aspects of The Matrix, Blade Runner, Minority Report, all those sorts of sci-fi classics.

Our main characters are formerly conjoined twins Tila and Taema. They're brown, bisexual and spent the first 16 years of their life in a cult called Mana's Hearth. I'm so entirely bored of straight, white protagonists so it's great to read a book where bisexuality is smoothly integrated.

I found it a fast-paced read and I did not want to put it down in the last half. Tila and Taema's alternating perspectives worked really well, we learned about both their present and past.

Nicely suspenseful. Decently hard sf. Had some points to make, but they were believably embedded within the characters and events.

I don't know how to rate this book, so I'm not going to.

Clo is a gifted mechanic who's tired of being kicked around. Eris is a soldier who's tired of killing. The Tholosian Empire is a merciless, brutal regime controlling half the galaxy – emphasis on the controlling. The Oracle is an AI that speaks directly to people's minds, telling them what to do, what to think, how to be. Clo and Eris are part of the resistance.

The universe-building in this story is phenomenal. The world the women inhabit is nothing like our own (on the surface at least). But it is *intense*. The world is exquisitely built – but it's a lot. There's so much to establish that it sometimes gets in the way of the story.

The characters – and there are five at the heart of this story – are all flawed, multi-dimensional, and wonderful.

The story is fascinating and intricate. Though, again, it sometimes gets lost in the world-building.

The pace is break-neck – except when it reverses to give the reader a view of the past. Expect literary whiplash.

The ending… What the frack is that? I get that the authors are setting up for a sequel – but I expect some things to be resolved. I expect each book to exist on its own, at least to a degree. To end the book just when absolutely everything that can possibly go wrong has seems cruel.

4.5 stars

In a world where women are 'discouraged' from professional careers, where climate change is rapidly making the Earth uninhabitable, five women conspire to steal a spaceship.

This book is not without its flaws, sure. For one thing: character motivation. Valerie has a clear and believable motivation for her actions. The other four? I don't know. What were they hoping to achieve? Why go to all that trouble just to be the first to set foot on the newly discovered Cavendish if you know you're going to be caught and arrested and probably executed for your crime? How would it benefit you or humanity?

For another, Valerie's transformation from hero (not the hero, but a hero none the less)… to cold-blooded killer was a bit too sharp of a turn to be entirely believable.

And yet… For all that, this is a hell of a book. The world Lam has created is both entirely believable and utterly terrifying. The characters are (for the most part) deeply human – flawed yet brilliant, fascinating yet realistic. And the story itself is a gripping, compelling read.

Goldilocks is a soap opera set in space about the future impact of climate change on our tenure on Earth and the quest to find another planet we might call home.

It's also about sexism and neocon politics leading to women being excluded from the workplace and the erosion of reproductive rights.

And it's a hokey old potboiler with a cartoon baddie and a heroine who, for me, doesn't quite hit the mark.

It was very readable and raises some interesting issues arising from our current trajectory as a species, but it wasn't the twisty thriller that it wanted to be.

I actually lost interest about 2/3rds of the way through. I only finished because I was nearly there anyways. The writing is good but the plot was so cliche.

The first half of the book seemed uninteresting and a bit predictable. I was worried about some tropes that were showing up. But then there were some unexpected twists that I ended up enjoying. All in all a fun read, but not as compelling as I had hoped.

The Goldilocks Zone: "Not too hot. Not too cold. The right temperature for water to be liquid on the surface given the right atmospheric pressure. For life to potentially grow."

Five women who have trained as astronauts are sidelined when a new authoritarian fundamentalist government pushes women out of the workforce. Humanity is facing extinction due to changes wrought by climate change, and there is a program in place to send a crew to a distant Earth-like planet as a possible world for humans to settle. The five women steal the spaceship that has been prepared for this probe, and head for the new planet. But along the way it becomes apparent that their commander Valerie may have ulterior motives that she has hidden from the other members of the crew.
The novel is told from the point of view of Naomi, a botanist, and Valerie's adopted daughter. Naomi is charged with growing food for the long voyage to the new planet, as well as genetically engineering new food plants that will grow on the new planet. She has been betrayed by Valerie in the past.
I am not a scientist, and I normally don't fret about whether or not the science in science fiction books is feasible or accurate. But I do like the characters in the books I read to act realistically and to be true to life with motivations that make sense. I didn't find that to always be the case with this book. It was good enough to keep me reading to find out what happened, but there were several things/characters that sometimes just did not ring true. So overall this is one I can't give an enthusiastic recommendation to.

2 stars

I liked this anecdote about John Glenn related in this book. When asked how he felt waiting to blast off as the first man to orbit Earth, he stated, "I felt exactly how you would feel if you were getting ready to launch and knew you were sitting on top of two million parts--all build by the lowest bidder on a government contract."

The main reason I was interested in this book is because I had heard it had diversity of sexuality and gender, which it did! There are lesbian, gay, and bi characters, and the main character is intersex and gender fluid and/or trans (a bit unclear since the people in the book use different labels than we do). However I wasn't always happy with how these identities and characters were handled. There were some negative tropes in plots and characterization, and there were some scenes that talked about the protagonists body in a way I found insensitive. Despite my criticism I appreciate that the author decided to include this kind of diversity in their story.

The worldbuilding and setting are very creative, but not something I personally enjoyed. I dont really like books about the circus for some reason, and I had trouble remembering what the different place names referred to. The alternating chapter setup was a bit tricky to understand at first but I figured out what was going on pretty fast. The summary on the back of this book is crap. I feel like the publisher was trying to trick people into reading an LGBTQ book and setting up the protagonists identity as a plot twist. Disappointing that the publisher decided to do this since there is a distinct shortage of books about intersex people.

I gave this book a low rating because of the issues I had with it, but if you like a kind of steampunk setting and circus and magic stories its worth checking out.

Sometimes the "suspension of disbelief" gets jarred a bit, but overall this is excellent. The attention to detail on the science, and on the character development is very impressive.

WHO SUCKED ME IN
Claire Rousseau in their PKD Award, Looking for Leia, The Watch & WTF Happened with the RWA?! - Genrewise #15 on YouTube published on 22 jan. 2020

teen fiction (gender identity/LGBTQ character). I picked up this book specifically because I had heard it had a great LGBTQ protagonist, but got bored with the pacing. By the time I got to chapter 6 (around page 52) I'd had enough. I get that Micah's past is a big plot twist, but I really don't see why it needs to be a BIG PLOT TWIST. He should just be, and then we can read about what happens to him after he joins the (probably dark and possibly magical) circus. But I never got that far because the story was still slowly and not that interestingly leading up to the revealing of his secret.

I would much rather have had an interesting story in which the character incidentally happens to be ___, rather than a story that is supposedly interesting because he is ____.

This is not feminist. It doesn't make it feminist to just put a load of women into the story. This is a collection of clichés and tropes cobbled together by someone who's only acquaintance with science-fiction appears to have been playing hack video games as a child. Not worth my time to finish it.

While each of the characters has an interesting backstory, having seven pov characters who also get chapters about their pasts left me feeling like I never really got to connect to any of them. More, in this case, felt like less: I think I'd have enjoyed the book more if there'd been only one or two pov characters.

The plot moved at a steady clip, but it never really gripped or surprised me.