Svetlana's Reads and Views

    Name of Book: The Trials of Empire Author: Richard Swan ISBN: 978-0-316-36198-9 Publisher: Orbit Part of a Series: Empire of the Wolf Type of book: Fantasy, dark, grim, law, religion, wars, exploring the world, mystery, religion vs secular laws, magic  Year it was published: 2024 Summary: The third novel in an epic fantasy trilogy, which follows the tale of Sir Konrad Vonvalt, an Emperor’s Justice – a detective, judge and executioner all in one. THE TIME OF JUDGEMENT IS AT HAND The Empire of the Wolf is on its knees, but there's life in the great beast yet. To save it, Sir Konrad Vonvalt and Helena must look beyond its borders for allies - to the wolfmen of the southern plains, and the pagan clans in the north. But old grievances run deep, and both factions would benefit from the fall of Sova. Even these allies might not be enough. Their enemy, the zealot Bartholomew Claver, wields infernal powers bestowed on him by a mysterious demonic patron. If Vonvalt and Helena a...

  Title of the book: Miss Kim Knows and other stories  Author: Cho Nam Joo (trans Jamie Chung)  Publisher: Live right  Publishing Date: 2024 ISBN: 978-1-324-09531-6 Summary: From the international best-selling author of Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982, a collection exploring the intimacies of contemporary Korean womanhood. A woman is born. A woman is filmed in public without consent. A woman suffers domestic violence. A woman is gaslit. A woman is discriminated against at work. A woman grows old. A woman becomes famous. A woman is hated, and loved, and then hated again. Written in Cho Nam-joo’s signature razor-sharp prose, Miss Kim Knows follows eight women, ranging from preteens to octogenarians, as they confront how gender shapes and orders their lives. In “Under the Plum Tree,” Mallyeo feels existential as she bears witness to her sister’s final days; in “Dear Hyunnam Oppa,” a college graduate musters the courage to leave her partner; and in “Grown-Up Girl,” a mother final...

    Name of Book: QUINCAS Borbas  Author: Machado De Assis (trans Margaret Jull Costa and Robin Peterson)   ISBN: 978-1-324-09068-7 Publisher: Live right  Type of book: Brazil, satire, wealth, social class, 1860s-1870s, finances, mental health, Rio De Janeiro, dog, philosophy, parable  Year it was published: 1891 (2024)  Summary: A vibrant new translation of Machado de Assis’s classic novel about a young man flush with newfound wealth, who promptly gets swindled. Hailed in his lifetime as Brazil’s greatest writer, Machado de Assis (1839–1908) has found a new generation of readers through a series of critically acclaimed translations by Margaret Jull Costa and Robin Patterson. Now, the duo returns to breathe new life into the irreverent, ambitious, and darkly funny Quincas Borba . Originally published in 1891, the novel begins with the death of its titular character, a mad philosopher infamous for spouting pessimistic theories of Humanitism. Borba ...

    Name of Book: Kim Jiyoung, born 1982 Author: Cho Nam-Joo (trans Jamie Chang) ISBN: 978-1-63149-867-1 Publisher: Live right  Type of book: South Korea 1982-2016, girlhood, womanhood, motherhood, working life, marriage, societal expectations and failures, economy, finances, demands, survival  Year it was published: 2016 (2021)  Summary: A fierce international bestseller that launched Korea’s new feminist movement, Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 follows one woman’s psychic deterioration in the face of rigid misogyny. Truly, flawlessly, completely, she became that person. In a small, tidy apartment on the outskirts of the frenzied metropolis of Seoul lives Kim Jiyoung. A thirtysomething-year-old “millennial everywoman,” she has recently left her white-collar desk job—in order to care for her newborn daughter full-time—as so many Korean women are expected to do. But she quickly begins to exhibit strange symptoms that alarm her husband, parents, and in-laws: Jiyoung imper...

  Name of Book: the WREN, the WREN  Author: Anne Enright  ISBN: 978-1-324-07603-2  Publisher: W.W. Norton  Type of book: mother/daughter relationships, time, abandonment, poetry, travel, curiosity, practicality, birds, nature, modern times, Ireland, lovers  Year it was published: 2023  Summary: Named a Most Anticipated Book of the Year by TIME , The Millions , and Literary Hub An incandescent novel from one of our greatest living novelists ( The Times ) about the inheritance of trauma, wonder, and love across three generations of women. Nell McDaragh never knew her grandfather, the celebrated Irish poet Phil McDaragh. But his love poems seem to speak directly to her. Restless and wryly self-assured, at twenty-two Nell leaves her mother Carmel’s orderly home to find her own voice as a writer (mostly online, ghost-blogging for an influencer) and to live a poetical life. As she chases obsessive love, damage, and transcendence, in Dublin and beyond, her g...

Name of Book: How to become the dark Lord and die trying  Author: Django Wexler  ISBN: 9780316392204 Publisher: Orbit Part of a Series: Dark Lord Davi  Type of book: comedy, satire, fantasy, adventure, flipping the fantasy tropes, power of evil vs good, quest, humans vs other humanoids, mastermind  Year it was published: 2024  Summary: Groundhog Day meets Guardians of the Galaxy in Django Wexler’s laugh-out-loud fantasy tale about a young woman who, tired of defending humanity from the Dark Lord, decides to become the Dark Lord herself. Davi has done this all before. She’s tried to be the hero and take down the all-powerful Dark Lord. A hundred times she’s rallied humanity and made the final charge. But the time loop always gets her in the end. Sometimes she’s killed quickly. Sometimes it takes a while. But she’s been defeated every time. This time? She’s done being the hero and done being stuck in this endless time loop. If the Dark Lord al...

Name of Book: The Tower of fools Author: Andrzej Sapkowski  ISBN: 9780316423694 Publisher: Orbit  Part of a Series: the hussite trilogy   Type of book: Poland, 1420s, fantasy, foiled love, family, reputation, religion, Latin tongue, church, anachronistic women, wealth, middle class  Year it was published: 2020 ( original 2002)  Summary: Reinmar of Bielawa, sometimes known as Reynevan, is a doctor, a magician and, according to some, a charlatan. And when a thoughtless indiscretion finds him caught in the crosshairs of powerful noble family, he is forced to flee his home. But once he passes beyond the city borders, he finds that there are dangers ahead as well as behind. Strange mystical forces are gathering in the shadows. And pursued not only by the affronted Stercza brothers, bent on vengeance, but also by the Holy Inquisition, Reynevan finds himself in the Narrenturm, the Tower of Fools. The Tower is an asylum for the mad, or for those who...