Raybearer and Small Pleasures
Mar. 31st, 2021 08:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alobearI finished the audiobook version of Raybearer by Jordan Ifueko this morning, and mostly really enjoyed it. The story is about a young girl, sent to audition to be part of the crown prince's council, until she discovers her mother had nefarious motives for sending her, and that she poses an unwilling threat to the succession in more than one way. Tarisai is a wonderful protagonist - very engaging, full of tremendous amounts of inner conflict, strong in her principles but challenged by opposing affections - and brought to life brilliantly by the excellent audio narrator. The range of characters and cultures, and the vividness of the setting make this book very immersive. I love the dynamics between Tarisai and her mother's followers, and between Tarisai and her council siblings, especially Sanjeet and Kirah.
The pace dipped quite a bit in the middle, while Tarisai was growing up in the palace and resisting the attempts of the prince to anoint her into the council. But the ending was very strong, with Tarisai really taking control of her destiny and setting up a really interesting dilemma and quest for book two.
Good storytelling, good characters, good world-building - all round a very good book.
Small Pleasures by Clare Chambers was another impulse purchase from Fox Lane Books and I'm coming back round to the feeling that I'm really glad I read it. It's about Jean Swinney, one of the few female reporters at a Kent local paper in 1957, who is assigned a story about a woman who claims to have had a virgin birth. Jean meets the family and gets very close to them, so that she is fully embroiled in their lives and stories when things start to fall apart.
Jean is a great protagonist - very easy to relate to, very sympathetic and strong in her own way. She faces personal struggles with caring duties for her elderly mother and jealousy of her sister, who lives a seemingly very active life in South Africa.
I loved all the characters, especially Howard, the husband of the supposed virgin mother. The intricacy of the story was well teased out, though the final reveal felt a bit tacked-on in some ways. But it was the development of the various inter-relationships and the consequences of the characters' actions in the present day of the story, not the past, that really made the book compelling all the way through.
I sensed potential doom early on, but the ending isn't explicit, so I choose to believe a different conclusion to the one that is perhaps more obvious.
Beautiful writing, and involving story and great characters - a really excellent read (if you discount some implications in the conclusion).
The pace dipped quite a bit in the middle, while Tarisai was growing up in the palace and resisting the attempts of the prince to anoint her into the council. But the ending was very strong, with Tarisai really taking control of her destiny and setting up a really interesting dilemma and quest for book two.
Good storytelling, good characters, good world-building - all round a very good book.
Small Pleasures by Clare Chambers was another impulse purchase from Fox Lane Books and I'm coming back round to the feeling that I'm really glad I read it. It's about Jean Swinney, one of the few female reporters at a Kent local paper in 1957, who is assigned a story about a woman who claims to have had a virgin birth. Jean meets the family and gets very close to them, so that she is fully embroiled in their lives and stories when things start to fall apart.
Jean is a great protagonist - very easy to relate to, very sympathetic and strong in her own way. She faces personal struggles with caring duties for her elderly mother and jealousy of her sister, who lives a seemingly very active life in South Africa.
I loved all the characters, especially Howard, the husband of the supposed virgin mother. The intricacy of the story was well teased out, though the final reveal felt a bit tacked-on in some ways. But it was the development of the various inter-relationships and the consequences of the characters' actions in the present day of the story, not the past, that really made the book compelling all the way through.
I sensed potential doom early on, but the ending isn't explicit, so I choose to believe a different conclusion to the one that is perhaps more obvious.
Beautiful writing, and involving story and great characters - a really excellent read (if you discount some implications in the conclusion).
