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Phil in SF

kingrat@sfba.club

Joined 1 year, 6 months ago

aka @kingrat@sfba.social. I'm following a lot of bookwyrm accounts, since that seems to be the only way to get reviews from larger servers to this small server. Also, I will like & boost a lot of reviews that come across my feed. I will follow most bookwyrm accounts back if they review & comment. Social reading should be social.

2024 In The Books

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Phil in SF's books

2025 Reading Goal

Success! Phil in SF has read 34 of 28 books.

avatar for kingrat Phil in SF boosted
John Steinbeck: The Moon is Down (1970, Bantam Books)

Worth reading.

No rating

The first thing you should know about “The Moon Is Down” by John Steinbeck is that it was written in March 1942 as Allied propaganda. It tells a story of the invasion and occupation of a small northern European village. The parties are not named, but it’s a clear depiction of the invasion of Norway by SS troops. It was clearly written to bolster the resolve of Allied soldiers and remind them that a larger, more powerful force is no match for the human spirit and our innate desire for freedom.

The second thing you should know is that it was published simultaneously as a novel and a play. The book is written in a manner that makes this clear. Short, impactful episodes with powerful dialogue tell a story of how the villagers resist their occupier; how the village mayor negotiates with and debates the decisions of the invading general; …

Adam Roberts: Lake of Darkness (EBook, 2024, Orion Books) No rating

Good is a construct. Evil is a virus.

The Starship Sa Niro and the Starship …

It was different enough to a handshake, and superior enough, to deserve all the palaver of having to lie down on your back and shuffle round to position your feet correctly.

Lake of Darkness by  (16%)

new vocabulary: palaver

unnecessarily elaborate or complex procedure

this book has so many new to me words. i haven't posted most of them. However, the story is not engrossing yet, so I'm already thinking of tossing on the DNF.

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Veronica Gorrie: Black and Blue (2021, Scribe Publications)

Harrowing

I feel bad rating this so low when it is such an important story to have told. It reads like someone dumping data (as she describes later on) - this happened then this happened then this happened then this happened. I almost DNF due to the stacking nature of one awful thing after another, but persisted out of respect for the fact it’s a true story and the events weren’t told for shock or awe, but to bear witness.

Adam Roberts: Lake of Darkness (EBook, 2024, Orion Books) No rating

Good is a construct. Evil is a virus.

The Starship Sa Niro and the Starship …

It is a congeries of related problems, chief amongst them radiation poisoning and bone-health from calcium loss, with modal health, mental–emotional well-being and temporal dysphasia coming close behind.

Lake of Darkness by  (4%)

new vocabulary: congeries

A disorderly collection; a jumble

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reviewed Rogue Protocol by Martha Wells (The Murderbot Diaries, #3)

Martha Wells: Rogue Protocol (2018)

SciFi’s favorite antisocial A.I. is again on a mission. The case against the too-big-to-fail GrayCris …

Rogue Protocol

This is the Murderbot novella that feels the most forgettable to me. It's not bad, but partially it's that it has the most action in it, which is fine and good but isn't really what I'm here for. I do like that it establishes that there are still dangers out there for Murderbot, even as it is wildly competent in its own domain.

When I’d called it a pet robot, I honestly thought I was exaggerating. This was going to be even more annoying than I had anticipated, and I had anticipated a pretty high level of annoyance, maybe as high as 85 percent. Now I was looking at 90 percent, possibly 95 percent.

The best part of this book is Miki, the human-form bot that Murderbot can't help but be irritated by. Miki ends up being a great foil, especially around Murderbot's feelings of not-jealousy about Miki's relationship with …

reviewed Billy Boyle by James R. Benn (A Billy Boyle WWII Mystery, #1)

James R. Benn: Billy Boyle (EBook, 2007, Soho Crime)

What’s a twenty-two-year-old Irish American cop who’s never been out of Massachusetts before doing at …

I liked it despite its flaws

Billy Boyle is a young Boston cop whose family pulls strings with their Congressman and "Uncle Ike" (Eisenhower) to get a cushy officer position rather than an infantry position in WW2. Ike wants to use him as a special investigator, and the first case is to root out a man who is part of the Norwegian government in exile and also a Nazi spy. While on the grounds of Beardsley Hall, where the Norwegian government-in-exile is located, one of two men competing for King Haakon's ear appears to be murdered. Boyle's search for the spy is now also a search for a murderer.

I found the story enjoyable, especially the early parts of the book where Boyle lays out how he's not really a top-notch detective. Rather he's barely made the rank when he was inducted. And the initial investigation stuff is great too, as it involves things like following …

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Anton Hur, Seolyeon Park: A Magical Girl Retires (Hardcover, 2024, HarperCollins Publishers)

Deceptively thought-provoking

The language is that of a young woman writing in her journal. The chapters are short, as is the book. Yet it manages to remind the reader of climate change, of class unfairness, of where the revenge motive leads. It starts with a girl on a bridge who sees nothing before her, and ends with that girl earning her future.

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reviewed The Potency of Ungovernable Impulses by Malka Older (The Investigations of Mossa and Pleiti, #3)

Malka Older: The Potency of Ungovernable Impulses (2025)

When a former classmate begs Pleiti for help on behalf of her cousin—who’s up for …

The Potency of Ungovernable Impulses

I wonder sometimes if too high expectations make me more likely to be disappointed in a book. I feel like the Mossa and Pleiti series should be my jam: it's lesbian scifi detective fiction set on an Oxford-esque Jupiter space habitats. This one was pretty good, but the first book is still my favorite.

The details of the mystery in this book are the most solid of the trilogy, and (in some ways) I like Pleiti getting a chance to try to do some investigating on her own. Unfortunately, the romance angle suffers from acute "please just talk to each other" syndrome where they each worry on their own about what the other is thinking and feeling.

This is also maybe a minor and petty opinion, but it felt like this book over-did loan words from other languages; arguably, in universe this could be part of the academic study of …

quoted Billy Boyle by James R. Benn (A Billy Boyle WWII Mystery, #1)

James R. Benn: Billy Boyle (EBook, 2007, Soho Crime)

What’s a twenty-two-year-old Irish American cop who’s never been out of Massachusetts before doing at …

Ah, Pouilly-Fumé, just my choice for turbot with hollandaise sauce!

Billy Boyle by  (A Billy Boyle WWII Mystery, #1) (17%)

new vocabulary: turbot

a European flatfish of inshore waters, which has large bony tubercles on the body and is prized as food.