The Fifth Season is the first book in a trilogy by N.K. Jemisin, it’s so very good and so very hard to push through. The book starts with an incident that essentially sets the tone for the whole novel. I am definitely waiting, with impatience, for the next one though. The book follows three different story lines throughout this strange fantasy world called The Stillness. This world suffers from frequent seismic activity leading to what the people call Seasons, periods of time where there is acid rain, […]
Canning with Alternative Sweeteners
A few years a go a friend introduced me to Marisa McClellan, her canning books, and by extension her blog; and I’ve been hooked ever since. Naturally Sweet Food in Jars is her latest cookbook. As a sidebar, is it really a cookbook if it has canning recipes? Canning isn’t exactly cooking, but at the same time, what else do you call it? At any rate, this cookbook features canning recipes that use more ‘natural’ sugars in place of refined white sugar. A few notes on […]
Imitation can be Fun, But it’s Rarely Art
Jane Austin has a number of imitators but rarely do any of those imitators come close to capturing what truly makes her works stand the test of time. I’m sorry to say that Shades of Milk and Honey doesn’t capture that magic either. This isn’t to say that it’s a bad book, it’s an enjoyable read, but I don’t think it’s a great book either. Rather it’s an imitation of a masterpiece, fine to look at but nothing memorable. Kowal does attempt to imbue something […]
Read a book they said, Travel to new worlds they said.
The Palace of Glass is book three in Django Wexler’s Forbidden Library series for middle grade readers. And I find myself, once again, with the problem of trying to introduce a series to you with the middle book. I’m going to try and review this book without spoiling the series, but just in case I want to tell you that you should absolutely read it. These are excellent middle grade novels. Django Wexler skyrocketed to my favorite authors list last year, going from totally unknown to […]