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I think The Iron Council was weaker than The Scar (which is the previous volume in the Bas-Lag/New Crobuzon trilogy), but I enjoyed it nearly as much, because I'm a sucker for revolutions. Also, it's noticeable just how skilled China Miéville is at talking about cities – each of the stories in the series describes at least one fundamentally foreign, weird city with a mix of cultures and races among the inhabitants, and thanks to the sublte worldbuilding and depth, I feel invested and interested in every one of them.

I'm now done with the trilogy, and I'm very happy I read it. I'll explore other works by China Miéville next!

I feel a bit like it's hard to judge All Systems Red on account of it being so short – it's fast-paced and engaging though, and I felt at least a bit invested in the story. But after reading it, I was more interested in reading the next part and finding out more about the world and the protagonist – the whole book felt a bit like it just provided a backdrop for the further series. As the series is generally well-liked though, I trust that things will pick up from here.

With The Skull Throne, the Demon Cycle is back where I love it: Character development including plenty of queer relationships (explicit working polyamory among them), people with relationship troubles, stubborn politicians, clever politicians, and the previously known and loved characters smack in the middle of it. The action is mostly split between two groups, with one dominating the first half and the other the second, which didn't always feel smooth – but both action and character development is well-rounded, and the established world building is expanded where necessary. Definitely a step up from the previous two books! I'm very much looking forward to the next book in the series.

Look to Windward tells the story of a reluctant counter-Culture agent and wasn't really my cup of tea. While I appreciated that we get to see more of the regular, day-to-day life of people in the Culture universe, and that we also get the outside perspective on the Culture, too little happened and the story crawled along. A bit after the halfway mark, things got a bit more exciting, but overall it wasn't one of the better Culture installments, I'd say.

There was nothing about The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin that I didn't like. It's a bit short, maybe, but we have two more volumes to balance that.

The Broken Earth is stunning scifi/fantasy. It contains a world with a huge (and very relevant) history. It has intricate and important environmental mechanics. It has different cultures, and those have different ticks and traditions grown from aforementioned history and environments. And these are the things that are the backdrop the reader is expected to pick up.

It's the backdrop to detailed, flawed, real characters. People who live in a hard world and make do in very different ways. And the author didn't take the easy way out, there are no "Not a Mary Sue But You Have To Love Me" people in there, either. The flaws of the main cast are sometimes grating, but always understandable.

And the writing is plain good, too – both the style and the pacing and the changes of both between narrative strands are truly well-done. Sometimes it allows the reader to be half a step ahead of the narrative, but only just, and never for long.

So, yes, this is a brilliant book, you should read it, and I can't wait to read the other two volumes. And in addition for all the things I've recounted here, be prepared to wonderful, not over-the-top, authentic queer characters. I don't think I've ever seen this level of thoughtful, practical, low-key inclusion of queerness in a book of anything approaching this quality.

Wow, Nemesis Games was way better than the previous volume of the Expanse series. I enjoyed it tremendously. As a change of pace, we follow four people on their separate ways (although their stories are connected, of course), and learn more about each of them. Where at first this seems to be a calmer book to allow for more characterisation, things take off towards the middle of the book, and then they just don't stop accelerating. I'm really looking forward to how both the world and the main cast will continue after this.

(I write reviews mostly to remind myself why I liked a book.)

I would have loved this book as a child, and I still love it as a grownup (Gaiman tends to write like that). It is paced well, written wonderfully and rings true (in a very similar way American Gods does, but a bit toned-down to the way children see the world). Technically it is a coming-of-age story. I spent a long afternoon reading it and feel a lot better for the time spent.

(My reviews are mostly to help me remember what happened in a book and why I liked/disliked it.)

Soo, the beginning of my favourite Stross series. You know: magic is advanced maths, kinda powerful geeks and really powerful burocracy.

I think it's noticable that Atrocity Archives is an early Stross book. In the first half, the Shibboleth/Shibboleet dropping is sometimes very obvious and a bit annoying. (Redeeming Stross though, he is actually knowledgable enough to actually use all those jokes, tropes and catchphrases, so it's ok.)

Plot: We meet Bob, who wants to join Active Service in the Laundry. Angleton and Andy, his bosses, send him to the USA, where he meets and saves Mo, who then returns to London and moves in with him (after Bob saves her again at her own doorstep).

To draw out their enemies Mo, Bob and secret reinforcements travel to Amsterdam for research, where Mo is promptly abducted to another universe. Bob joins the reconnaissance team. Turns out, in a close parallel universe to our own one, the Nazis finished their arcane project by summoning an Infovore and travelling to that world (some ice giants included). The Infovore sucked the universe dry and is now trying to get all of itself over to Bob's universe. With judicious use of some Hands of Glory and an H-Bomb they manage to save Mo, Bob and about half the crew.