Eden: It's an Endless World! Volume 1 (Endo)

Eden: It's an Endless World! Volume 1
Hiroki Endo (1997/2005)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This was a book that I picked up at Readercon in Boston, MA back in July. It was on the freebies table, and I only took it because it was volume one.

From Good Reads:

Eden Volume One is both a brilliant love song to the post-apocalyptic survival genre and the beginning of a deep exploration on man's role in the natural order. In the near future, a large portion of humanity is wiped out by a brutal, new virus that hardens the skin while dissolving internal organs. Those who aren't immune are either severely crippled or allowed to live with cybernetically enhanced bodies. Taking advantage of a world in chaos, a paramilitary force known as the Propater topples the United Nations and seeks world domination. Elijah, a young survivor searching for his mother, travels towards the Andes Mountains with an artificially intelligent combat robot. When he encounters a group of anti-Propater freedom fighters, a maelstrom of unique characters unfolds. Graphic, cyberpunk, and philosophical, Eden is a place where endearing heroes face a constant struggle for survival and violent surprises wait around every corner!

It was an interesting story and a quick read. It's not available from any of the local libraries. The series was popular when it came out in English, or so I've read.

The story follows two immune teens and a scientist who is succumbing to the disease and who also had a hand it its spread. There are a lot of flashbacks to a time when the virus started and pockets of humanity are protected within governmental walls.

It then jumps ahead a generation where the child of the two teens is traveling with a robot.

No, I'm not describing it well. Also, I'm curious what happened to his parents.

The Inheritance of Orquídea Divina (Córdova)

The Inheritance of Orquídea Divina
Zoraida Córdova (2021)

[AUDIO BOOK -- I don't include covers for audiobooks unless I've read them as well.]

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This book was a Pandemic Book Club alternate selection. That is, it didn't win the group poll. However, I requested all the books as soon as the poll went up because many times there are holds for these books. The audiobook became available, so I listened to it. I don't remember what the wait was for the ebook, but since it didn't win, I didn't worry about it.

This was an enjoyable book although I might've restarted it early on because sometimes it's difficult to focus on the book while I'm out walking or because there's traffic or overhead trains running by. (I do this often.) I need to be doing something when I listen to audiobooks. I can't just sit there, not even on a subway.

The book bounces around between the past and the present. We learn that Orquidea didn't know who her father was, that she ran away with the circus, and that she had five husbands during his lifetime, so he used different names at different times.

Her grandchildren show up Four Rivers when she's dying to find out about their inheritance. There's more backstory into the grandchildren as well. In particular, we get to know a lot about Marymar, a name that is said many, many times and that I sometimes laughed at how it is pronounced for no reason. (On the other hand, I was a little annoying sometimes, so maybe I was smirking at my own annoyance.) It was later mentioned that her name meant "sea and sea" or "sea to sea", so it's either Marymar or Maramar. It's sounded more like a "y".

The story takes weird turns when Orquidea dies and turns into a tree. This is not metaphorical. And later, SPOILER, there are space aliens involved. I did NOT see that coming.

Would I consider reading this? Yes, but.

The "but" is because I'm so backed up with reading. I have the book club books, the Library Thing books (I'm 2 behind at the moment), books on hold at the library that I keep postponing and saying "deliver later", and books that I just want to read but haven't gotten around to yet. If this is still on hold, then it'll show up at some point. If it isn't on hold, there's a good chance that I'll forget about it until my end-of-year review.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

The Bee Sting (Murray)

The Bee Sting
Pauy Murray (2023)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This book was a Pandemic Book Club selection. It was also a 600+ page slogfest. If it had not been for the book club, I would have DNF'ed it 100 pages in -- by 200 for sure. As it was, I still had 150 pages to go when the meeting happened. I had already been spoiled that the book was left open-ended, which after 640 pages is a little outrageous. During the meeting, I discovered just what it was that was left open-ended. I was satisfied that I didn't need to read this book.

At the point where I considered dropping this book, I wrote the following on Good Reads:

First, there are no quotation marks, which gets a little confusing. Then almost all of the other punctuation disappears. Then there’s a slog of a chapter that’s literally 100 pages long, and you want to k!ll yourself instead If this hadn’t been a book club book, I wouldn’t have pushed on as far as I did, and I still couldn’t bring myself to finish it. I just didn’t care about anybody, how their lives were or where they’d end up, or even about that bee sting A good editor would’ve cut between 2-300 pages from this monstrosity. If there was a reason for it to be this long, I never got to it.

After the meeting, I was happy to put that book aside and read something else, The Bartender Between Worlds, which I enjoyed very much.

I started reading the next Book Club pick, but then I decided that I would power through this book.

Let me say right off: it didn't get better. It got worse. For the last 100 pages or so, it switched to Second Person POV, because it needed a fresh layer of Hell. And it applied this to all the different POV characters that it had. It wasn't using it to make the reader the POV character.

Yes, playing with the format might've been a storytelling tactic. It was an absolutely abyssmal choice.

The icing on the wedding cake came in Part III when it switched to a script format, except it wasn't a script. Just the formatting on the page was so you'd know with Second Person POV was involved in this bit. The main reason for the script, as far as I can tell, was because all the players were being brought onto a single stage so that open-ended ending could take place.

I never got the answer to my question, why this book had to be so long. On the other hand, they did address the "bee sting" in a way that explained why it was important enough to be the title of the book, and like so much that came before it, everything is a lie.

In the end, every adult is morally reprehensible for one reason or another, and when faced with a moral quandary tend to fail.

But, I got through this book and can return to next month's book, which is already better, and not quite as long.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

The Bartender Between Worlds (Steuernagel)

The Bartender Between Worlds
Herman Steuernagel (2024)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

It would be faint praise to say that this is the best book that I've read in a while. However, I really enjoyed this book. I don't remember how I heard of this book, but once I heard the title, I looked it up. The cover didn't sell me on the book, but it did help.

To be honest, I was curious because one of my writing prompt responses does have a bar between worlds. But it isn't an actual story. It's more of a behinning of something that needs a lot more. It could be a setting for a related set of short stories.

Thankfully, this book was nothing like mine.

First of all, the main character Emma isn't a bartender. She's a Hunter of people touched by magic, until she realizes that she's touched by magic. Then she tries to escape her life and wants to be a bartender because her magic affects alcohol. And she doesn't become a bartender "between" worlds but across different dimensions. Also, dimension hopping happens through portals, so there isn't any "between", no etheral plane, as well. That's not a criticism, just an explanation.

The story takes place across a handful of worlds that are all recognizeable but wildly different. Still, the counterparts of the main characters can, and do, inhabit these new Earths.

The original Earth starts generic fantasy English although there is mention of railroads. Emma encounters a fairy and a wizard. The wizard is a professor from another world who is trapped here because his device no longer works. I thought he was going to be steampunk, but he's actually from a 21st century world like our own without any magic. This proves difficult for the magic users, so they leave again to do more research on dimension hopping.

It was a quick read and under 300 pages, both of which I appreciated after a couple of books that I slogged through.

I enjoyed this book. I would consider reading a sequel.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

Write Something (Levenberg)

Write Something
Mitch Levenberg (2015)

This was not the cover of the book that I read, but that image doesn't seem to be available anywhere online

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

I'm not sure where this book came from. It either came out of a Little Free Library, or I brought it back from Readercon in Boston. I think Boston is probably the correct answer because I don't think I've had it for very long. It feels like I just got this, and that it hasn't been in my basement for a couple years. There are no stamps to indicate it was owned by a school or a library.

This book is 17 short essays (columns?) about reading, writing, Brooklyn, Flushing, Coffee, Cuban Coffee, Mosquitoes and whatever. Okay to read. Nothing memorable.

That's the summary. There isn't anything more to say about it, other than, if this can be a book, then I can write books, too.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. A fantastical foursome of flash fiction and short stories.

The Dream Keeper and Other Poems (Hughes)

The Dream Keeper and Other Poems
Langston Hughes (1932/1994)

Illustrated by Brian Pinkney

This was not the cover of the book that I read, but that image doesn't seem to be available anywhere online

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This was a book that I borrowed from school last summer but didn't read until this one. I found it (and many, many others) shut up in a locker in the back of my classroom that I practically had to pry open.

The introduction and other material were copyright 1994. Also, this edition had "Additional Material", that is, extra poems from Hughes, included.

I can't say that I've ever read a collection of poems by Langston Hughes. I'm sure we covered one or two somewhere in college, and I've seen poems referenced in textbooks and newspaper columns. But actually read a collection? No.

This has been rectified.

Some of the shorter poems up front were surprising. They were some little ditties, light verse, out of context that may have meant more to me 100 years ago. I appreciated the longer poems, which had meter, rhyme, or some structure to them, unlike the modern free verse I encounter too often. I enjoyed the note of the differences between spirituals and blues.

The book was about 80 pages, divided into sections: The Dream Keeper, Sea Charm, Dressed Up, Feet O' Jesus, Walkers with the Dawn, and Additional Poems. I enjoyed the illustrations as well.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. The fourth book will be available by the time you see this!

In the Margins: They found their place by not fitting in (Shea)

In the Margins: They found their place by not fitting in
John Shea (2012)

This was not the cover of the book that I read, but that image doesn't seem to be available anywhere online

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This was a book that I borrowed from school last summer but didn't read until this one. I found it (and many, many others) shut up in a locker in the back of my classroom that I practically had to pry open.

This book is essentially two half-books. The first half is about Sherman Alexie, author of The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (which I also saw in that classroom locker), his life growing up on and off of the reservation. The second half is about Julia Alvarez, author of In the Time of Butterflies, and her life growing up and leaving the Dominican Republic.

It was a quick, informative read. I can't say I've heard of either one of them before, but I am aware of them now. Ms. Alvarez has quite the bibliography, so I might pick something out to read at a later date.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. The fourth book will be available by the time you see this!

Trial by Moonlight (Hanford)

Trial by Moonlight,
A Rise of the Summer God Adventure,
Summer H. Hanford (2024)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

This was a booklet that I picked up at World Fantasy Con in Niagara Falls, NY, 2024. It's only 46 pages, and an additional ten pages for a preview of another book, but it's bound like a book, and longer than the other novellas I picked up, so I'm calling it a book. (And this will balance out with the number of 400+ pagers I've been reading lately.)

Aldera came to live in the pines of Ravenwood with her mother. She wasn't born there, but she wants to be accepted there. And she wants to learn the ways of the witches there and be able (one day) to transform into a raven. She is woken on the night of her 12th birthday by the other girls to undergo a three-part test. She almost doesn't survive.

Not much else to say about it.

There's a cool two-page map where I assume the Summer God adventures take place, but this entire story takes place in basically one location (though they move around to three parts of that area).

It was a pleasant, quick read, and I really needed some quick reads after some of the things that I've ploughed through lately.

If you stumbled across my page via the Internet, please check out my short book series, Burke Lore Briefs. The fourth book will be available by the time you see this!