November 2020 Roundup – Reading, Writing and Blogging… #BrainfluffNovember2020Roundup

November was defined chiefly by the second lockdown in the UK, and although it wasn’t as strict as the first one, it did bring my social life to an abrupt halt again. So other than seeing the grandchildren when necessary (we are part of our daughter’s support cluster as she is a single-parent family) and shopping when Himself wasn’t able to fulfil the brief, I hunkered down at home, busy writing and reading. Other than teaching Tim, which I did resume after a long, serious discussion weighing the pros and cons with his mother…

Reading
I read twelve books in November, which isn’t a particularly large number – but that’s okay. More importantly, once again it’s been a great reading month qualitywise – particularly for space opera and space adventures in general. Because this was #Sci Fi Month 2020, which was once again organised by Imyril at There’s Always Room for One More and Lisa at Dear Geek Place and was a huge success.

My Outstanding Book of the Month was Nophek Gloss by Essa Hansen and my Outstanding Audiobook of the Month was Wintersmith – Book 3 of the Tiffany Aching series by Terry Pratchett.

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My reads during November were:

Dead Lies Dreaming – a Laundry Files novel by Charles Stross. See my review.

AUDIOBOOK Wintersmith – Book 35 of the Discworld novels & Book 3 of the Tiffany Aching series by Terry Pratchett – Outstanding Audiobook of the month. Review to follow.

Architects of Memory – Book 1 of The Memory War series by Karen Osborne. Review to follow.

The Thief on the Winged Horse by Kate Mascarenhas. See my review.

Angel Six Echo by Robert Appleton. See my review.

AUDIOBOOK The Son of Neptune – Book 2 of The Heroes of Olympus series by Rick Riordan. Review to follow

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Nophek Gloss – Book 1 of The Graven by Essa Hansen. Outstanding book of the month. See my review.

The Sculpted Ship by K.M. O’Brien. See my review.

Aftermath – Book 5 of the Sirantha Jax series by Ann Aguirre. Review to follow.

Fallen – Book 10 of the Alex Verus series by Benedict Jacka. See my review.

Lifelode by Jo Walton. Review to follow.

The Dark Archive – Book 7 of The Invisible Library series by Genevieve Cogman. See my review.

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Writing and Editing
Halfway through the month, I finally completed the manuscript for Picky Eaters 2 – which initially was going to be a novella – only to discover that it was a monster of over 117,000 words! I will be writing about all this in more detail in a separate post later in the month – but basically that was just nonsense. I’m not in the mood right now to read anything of that length – so why would I expect my readers to do so, either? Particularly as the whole point of this series is to provide some escapist fun. So I rolled up my sleeves and dived in. It took nearly a week of hard work and rewriting – but I now have a version of Picky Eaters 2, renamed Flame and Blame, that I’m happy with at just under 73,000 words. The great news is that I also have just under 50,000 words of the next novel in the trilogy, which will be called Trouble With Dwarves.

Overall, I wrote just over 61,300 words in November, with just under 20,000 on the blog, and just under 40,000 on my writing projects. This brings my yearly wordcount to date to just under 477,000 words. I’m very happy with that – the increased in the speed of my writing since I returned from Bexhill has been a gamechanger and should mean that next year will be far more productive.

Blogging
Blogging revolved around Sci Fi Month, which was a joy. I added far too many books to my towering TBR and was able to swing by and chat to some other blogs I don’t regularly visit. Though as I battled with teasing apart my manuscript during the second half of the month, I’m afraid my visiting once more suffered. Sorry about that! In the meantime, I hope everyone is able to stay safe. Take care.x

*NEW RELEASE SPECIAL* Review of NETGALLEY arc Angel Six Echo by Robert Appleton #BrainfluffNETGALLEYbookreview #AngelSixEchobookreview #SciFiMonth2020

I loved the sound of this one – a former black ops fighter rescuing a spouse, who has joined a vicious war without realising exactly what they’re getting into. Given that the wife is the black ops fighter and the husband is the spouse – throw in the alien combat suit, how could I resist? I am linking this post to #Sci Fi Month 2020.

BLURB: Armed with a fabled combat suit left to her by a dying warrior race, Gabby Rojas enters the deadliest standoff of the war as a rogue sniper with one goal: to keep her husband alive at all costs. Dalton is a high school teacher, not a soldier, but he’s volunteered to fight for the good of the colonies, against her advice. Gabby, on the other hand, is a black-ops prodigy who turned her back on the military years ago. The consequences of re-entering the fray alone like this, wielding the power of her extraordinary armoured suit, could tip the balance of power in the galaxy…

REVIEW: This was a thoroughly entertaining read. Gabby is a super-soldier, trained from childhood to become part of an infamous black ops unit. Until she broke – both physically and mentally. And Dalton, kind, non-judgemental and caring helped put her back together again – and in the process of doing so, they fell in love… The relationship between them is touchingly portrayed – they are clearly passionate about each other. And I liked them both very much. Dalton is rather goofy, easy-going and with a charm that is attractive. Not innate super-soldier material, so it’s just as well that he’s a coms specialist, tasked with keeping in touch with those out on the front line, trying to stave off the increasingly bleak odds they are facing. Gabby is driven, single-minded and ruthless. She doesn’t kill needlessly, but will do so without a qualm if it becomes necessary.

The supporting characters worked well and I thought the battle scenes were well written. Appleton manages to balance the necessary explanation and the full-on action without losing the reader or holding up the pace, which is harder to do than he makes it look. I liked the fact that things often went wrong – plans didn’t work out, and those in the front line paid the price. There are deaths of characters I’d grown to like, but nothing that felt manipulative or careless. Gabby’s relationship with the suit was well handled – inevitably there was stuff that wasn’t explained, because neither Gabby nor the suit really knew what was going on. But I felt that was okay.

What, for me, was never really tackled adequately, was why Dalton – kind, caring husband who knew his wife was emotionally very reliant on him – suddenly ups and leaves for the front line. He always talks of her with great fondness, evidently missing her. And yet, even though he knew she was desperate for him to stay – he left. I would have been a lot happier if he’d been randomly picked in some sort of lottery system, for example.

But other than that one niggle, I found this to be an engrossing and at times, really poignant story of love, loss and hard decisions made in the heat of battle. Oh, and some really nasty aliens! The ending wasn’t what I was expecting, but it did work. Recommended for fans of character-led military sci fi adventure.
8/10

Sunday Post – 15th November, 2020 #Brainfluffbookblog #SundayPost

This is part of the weekly meme over at the Caffeinated Reviewer, where book bloggers can share the books and blogs they have written.

We weren’t around last Sunday, hence my absence. It’s been a busy week. On Tuesday night we helped celebrate my grandson’s 11^th birthday – I can’t quite believe it… Where has the time gone? My writing club had a Zoom get-together on Wednesday, where I read out my very lame lyrics of an imaginary 1980s pop song, and we chatted about our writing projects. And tried to recall what it was like when we used to sit around a real kitchen table, eating cake and downing mugs of tea. On Thursday, I gave a short presentation via Zoom, again, to the West Sussex Writers’ meeting on the results of the Non-Fiction Competition, which I’d been judging. It was lovely to see many familiar faces, including a number of former Creative Writing students. And on Friday, I went over to look after little Eliza while my daughter listened to a lecture on… you guessed it – Zoom! We brought the boys back here to stay overnight and took them back home yesterday.

I am loving Sci Fi Month – thank you so much to Imyril at There’s Always Room for One More and Lisa at Dear Geek Place for hosting this marvellous event. On the writing front, I’m still working on Picky Eaters 2 – though it’s turning out to be rather too long to be a quick, easy read, so I’m probably going to be splitting up Castellan’s adventures.

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My photos this week are from a rather soggy garden…


Last week I read:

The Thief on the Winged Horse by Kate Mascarenhas
The Kendrick family have been making world-famous dolls since the early 1800s. But their dolls aren’t coveted for the craftmanship alone. Each one has a specific emotion laid on it by its creator. A magic that can make you feel bucolic bliss or consuming paranoia at a single touch. Though founded by sisters, now only men may know the secrets of the workshop.

Persephone Kendrick longs to break tradition and learn the family craft, and when a handsome stranger arrives claiming doll-making talent and a blood tie to the Kendricks, she sees a chance to grasp all she desires.
This quirky fantasy with a difference was an engrossing, enjoyable read, while the story went off in unexpected directions.


Angel Six Echo by Robert Appleton
Armed with a fabled combat suit left to her by a dying warrior race, Gabby Rojas enters the deadliest standoff of the war as a rogue sniper with one goal: to keep her husband alive at all costs. Dalton is a high school teacher, not a soldier, but he’s volunteered to fight for the good of the colonies, against her advice. Gabby, on the other hand, is a black-ops prodigy who turned her back on the military years ago. The consequences of re-entering the fray alone like this, wielding the power of her extraordinary armoured suit, could tip the balance of power in the galaxy.
This military sci fi adventure, featuring a super-soldier wife who goes rogue to rescue her clever, geeky husband, who ill-advisedly joins up, is an entertaining, action-packed read. I just couldn’t figure out exactly why happily married Dalton wanted to join up in the first place… Review to follow.

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AUDIOBOOK The Son of Neptune – Book 2 of The Heroes of Olympus by Rick Riordan
PERCY IS CONFUSED. When he awoke from his long sleep, he didn’t know much more than his name. His brain fuzz is lingering, even after the wolf Lupa told him he is a demigod and trained him to fight with the pen/sword in his pocket. Somehow Percy manages to make it to a camp for half-bloods, despite the fact that he has to keep killing monsters along the way. But the camp doesn’t ring any bells with him. The only thing he can recall from his past is another name: Annabeth.

HAZEL IS SUPPOSED TO BE DEAD. When she lived before, she didn’t do a very good job of it. Sure, she was an obedient daughter, even when her mother was possessed by greed. But that was the problem—when the Voice took over her mother and commanded Hazel to use her “gift” for an evil purpose, Hazel couldn’t say no. Now because of her mistake, the future of the world is at risk. Hazel wishes she could ride away from it all on the stallion that appears in her dreams.

FRANK IS A KLUTZ. His grandmother says he is descended from heroes and can be anything he wants to be, but he doesn’t see it. He doesn’t even know who his father is. He keeps hoping Apollo will claim him, because the only thing he is good at is archery—although not good enough to win camp war games. His bulky physique makes him feel like an ox, especially in front of Hazel, his closest friend at camp. He trusts her completely—enough to share the secret he holds close to his heart.

Beginning at the “other” camp for half-bloods and extending as far as the land beyond the gods, this breathtaking second installment of the Heroes of Olympus series introduces new demigods, revives fearsome monsters, and features other remarkable creatures, all destined to play a part in the Prophesy of Seven.
This spinoff from the Percy Jackson series delivers the same witty, action-packed adventures that made the original series so much fun to listen to – and I’m delighted we’ve more Riordan goodness stored on my Kindle. Mini-review to follow.


My posts last week:

Castellan the Black and His Wise Draconic Sayings

Review of Hammered – Book 1 of the Wetwired series by Elizabeth Bear

Friday Face-off featuring Synners by Pat Cadigan

*NEW RELEASE SPECIAL* Review of The Thief on the Winged Horse by Kate Mascarenhas

Covet the Covers featuring the Vorkosigan Saga covers by Lois McMaster Bujold

Can’t-Wait Wednesday featuring The Expert System’s Champion by Adrian Tchaikovsky

Review of INDIE Ebook Even Stranger – Book 2 of the Strange series by Marilyn Messik

Tuesday Treasures – 19

Review of The Fated Sky – Book 1 of the Lady Astronaut series by Mary Robinette Griffiths


Thank you for visiting, reading, liking and/or commenting on my blog – I hope you and yours have a peaceful, healthy week. Take care.

Can’t-Wait Wednesday – 4th November, 2020 #Brainfluffbookblog #CWC #WOW

Can’t-Wait Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted at Wishful Endings, to spotlight and discuss the books we’re excited about that we have yet to read. Generally they’re books that have yet to be released. It’s based on Waiting on Wednesday, hosted by the fabulous Jill at Breaking the Spine. I have linked this post to #Sci Fi Month 2020…

This week’s Can’t-Wait offering – Angel Six Echo by Robert Appleton – release date 17th October 2020

#science fiction #alien contact #military adventure

BLURB: Armed with a fabled combat suit left to her by a dying warrior race, Gabby Rojas enters the deadliest standoff of the war as a rogue sniper with one goal: to keep her husband alive at all costs. Dalton is a high school teacher, not a soldier, but he’s volunteered to fight for the good of the colonies, against her advice. Gabby, on the other hand, is a black-ops prodigy who turned her back on the military years ago. The consequences of re-entering the fray alone like this, wielding the power of her extraordinary armoured suit, could tip the balance of power in the galaxy.

To reach her full potential, she must bond with the suit over six gruelling stages. She doesn’t know what form they will take, only that the final bonding is permanent, and any changes made to her will be irreversible. Can she see Dalton safely off Orontes before the final transformation? Stealth is her ally, but it’s tough to stay inconspicuous when you’re taking tactical combat to the next level. No human has seen anything like the things she can do, and word of her exploits soon spreads across the colonies, attracting the attention of powerful enemies, including her old alien nemeses, the Finaglers.

I love the sound of this one! I’m a sucker for a tale where it’s the feisty heroine plunging into the fray to rescue her other half – given I was brought up on tales where it was always the opposite dynamic😊. And throw in an alien combat suit with uncanny killer powers and I was sold!