Recently I finished The Blade Itself by Joe Abercrombie, Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson, Carrie by Stephen King, Ender's Game and Speaker for the Dead by Orson Scott Card, A Batalha do Apocalipse by Eduardo Spohr and Consider Phlebas by Iain M. Banks. Currently I'm reading Pet Sematary by SK.
The Blade Itself was amazing. Well-devoped characters with very different voices, personalities, morals and motivations. Everyone (including minor characters) gets a chance to shine and be portrayed as human. The only thing I didn't like is that every once in a while two characters are going to say something in the same paragraph, and that really hurts the reading flow.
Mistborn was so much better than I expected. Many people on the old forum said bad things about Sanderson's writing, so I expected this to either bore or annoy me. Boy, was I wrong. I think it took me three sittings to read this one cover to cover, and I want more. Great world building, great magic system (I'm new to high fantasy, so that is sort of a new concept to me), surprisingly developed characters and some twists that I didn't see coming at all.
Carrie took me a single sitting to read and was just what I expected it to be: the first display of talent from my husbando. It was fun to read stuff that would become recurring themes in his work, such as religious fanaticism, bullying and domestic violence. It was also nice to notice some insecurities here and there, and to see how far he has come as a writer. Great stuff.
Ender's Game and Speaker for the Dead were very different books. At first I found Ender and company to be hard to believe as children. They seemed too adult to me, especially by the way they talk. But hey, they were very bright children, so maybe that could be forgiven. As soon as I got used to the idea, Ender's Game became a very pleasant experience with a plot twist like no other. Speaker for the Dead was very different. That book has pretty much no action. Its conflicts are personal and psychological rather than physical, and I liked the way Card built Lusitania and its inhabitants, both human and Piggies. Two things I would like to point out: This book's message on tolerance and understanding is very surprising considering Card's views on homosexuality, and it's almost comical how he puts other religions under scrutiny, but never his own.
A Batalha do Apocalipse was an endless disappointment. That book was recommended ad nauseam to me by friends and some internet celebrities I used to like (the guys at Jovem Nerd's Nerdcast). People all over Brazilian internet kept saying how this book was the best fantasy in our language and yadda yadda. Man, if that really is the best we have to offer, then I'll forget fantasy altogether and go back to Rubem Fonseca's and Patrícia Melo's amazing crime thrillers. Well, where do I start? Paper-thin characters with stupid motivations, bad writing filled with repetition ("here is the piece of information I gave you only five pages ago, in case you forgot"), bad exposition, characters explaining why their adversary's unblockable technique didn't work (Saint Seiya, anyone?), at least half a dozen moments the protagonist "would never forget in all his life", plot twists you can see coming ten light-years away, boring Mary Sue protagonist who of course has nordic features, has long hair, wears black and rides a Harley Davidson. I could go on and on. This book sounded like it was written for teenagers who like anime such as Dragon Ball and Saint Seiya, which is not a bad idea if that's one's cup of tea, but it was badly executed. There was some good stuff though: Sporh mixes Christianity with many other mythologies like Hindu, Norse and Babylonian. It also seems like he researched lots of History in order to depict different time periods. Oh, and the final plot twist was a good one.
Consider Phlebas was a tough read. I really don't have much to say about this one other than it surprised me a lot, being much darker than I expected. There's a lot of fucked-up stuff going on, some of them very disturbing and disheartening. Great book, I'm looking forward to reading the rest of the Culture novels.
Pet Sematary might be the first book that really moved me emotionally. I just started part two and it depressed the he oit of me, which is great. I have no idea where this is going, but I'm loving this book, which is expected considering that Stephen King has my undying love and I'll kick your ass if you talk shit about him. ;)
Sorry for the long post, everyone.
