thistlechaser: (Book with cat 2)
Slow Bullets by Alastair Reynolds
Traditional or self-published: Traditional
Rating: Loved (Hated-Disliked-Okay-Liked-Loved)



I almost gave up on this book before I started it. No copyright info (which usually means self published), and more "Praise for the Author" pages than I ever saw in any other book. Praise for the author, praise for this book, praise for that one... Turns out it's not self published, and even more surprisingly, turns out that praise was deserved.

I loved this book. Told in first person, the main character speaking to the reader, it felt so completely personal.

Set in the distant future and in space, a war between planets was just ending. War criminals from both sides (and some innocent people who got scooped up), were all put onto a ship to be sent somewhere far out of the way.

Something happened with the ship's drive, and the ship ended up mostly dead and cut off from everything. How could people who last remembered being at war get along long enough to figure out what happened? And these weren't even just soldiers, but the worst of the worst.

Because of how the story was told (the main character speaking to the reader), some details were lacking in the story. For example, where were they sending the prisoners? I have no idea, but it really doesn't matter at all. We didn't need to know, but now that the story is over, I'm curious about everything we didn't see.

I loved the story, the characters, the tech. All of it was so very good.

The Test (Animorphs #43) by "K. A. Applegate" (Ellen Geroux)
Traditional or self-published: Traditional
Rating: Loved (Hated-Disliked-Okay-Liked-Loved)



A few books back, Tobias was tortured. Seriously tortured. For hours. Physically and mentally. He was broken. He was nearly killed. Most of the kids are dealing with PTSD over the whole war in general, but for Tobias it's more this one single event that haunts him.

In this book, he not just came face to face with his torturer again, the whole Animorphs group had to work with her.

Add onto that that they morphed into probably the worst thing ever to be: Taxxon. An alien race, basically a massive worm that does nothing but eat nonstop. Dirt, people, items, anything nearby, it eats.

The plot in this book was more complex than usual for these books, which is a really nice thing. Add that to this being a Tobias POV book, with him dealing with his torturer, and it really was something else.

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