Happy Wednesday to all! I hope you’ve had a great day!
But yeah, Can’t-Wait Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Tressa @ Wishful Endings (and was previously hosted by Jill @ Breaking the Spine where it was known as Waiting on Wednesday) to spotlight and discuss the books we’re excited about that we have yet to read. They’re usually books that have not yet been released.
I don’t want to detract from this book, but I also recently discovered that Patrick Ness is releasing Piper at the Gates of Dusk, which is the first book in a new trilogy called The New World, which is a continuation of his Chaos Walking universe – a trilogy of books that I absolutely adore. I even did a post about how much I love it a while back.
Anyway, I’m not sure how I feel about it. I’m somewhat excited and interested, of course, but it’s been a long time since Chaos Walking (I’m not even getting into that terrible movie adaptationthing that doesn’t exist). But yeah, I’m interested in it, but I’m not sure when or if I’m gonna read it – the Chaos Walking trilogy had a great ending. All I needed to know was what happened to Todd and Viola afterwards, and seeing as the plot summary says they’re married with kids, I’m pretty good.
But yeah, into another awesome looking book – and the one I’m highlighting for this week’s Can’t-Wait Wednesday – The Subtle Art of Folding Space!
The Subtle Art of Folding Space, is the exhilarating debut science fiction novel from Nebula and Hugo-winning author John Chu channels unhinged physics, generational trauma, and the comfort of really good dim sum. This isn’t your usual jaunt through quantum physics.
Ellie’s universe, and this one, is falling apart. Her ailing mother is in a coma; her sister, Chris, accuses her of being insufficiently Chinese between assassination attempts; and a shadowy cabal of engineers is trying to hijack the skunkworks, the machinery that keeps the physics of each universe working the way it’s supposed to.
Daniel, Ellie’s cousin, has found an illicit device in the skunkworks – one that keeps Ellie’s comatose mother alive while also creating destabilizing bugs in the physics of this universe. It’s not a good day.
If she can confront her mother’s legacy and overcome her family’s generational trauma, she just might find a way to preserve the skunkworks and reconcile with her sister… but digging into her family’s past is thornier than it seems, and the secrets she uncovers will force Ellie to choose between her family and the universe itself.
Are you looking forward to The Subtle Art of Folding Space? What books are coming out in the near future that you’re looking forward to?
As always, thank you all so much for reading and have a fantastic day/night!
Helloooo everyone! Happy Tuesday! It’s been awhile since I’ve participated in Top Ten Tuesday – there’s been a lot going on lately, outside of the blog – so I’ve been a bit iffy with my posts for the past few weeks. But I decided it’s been way too long since the last time I properly engaged with this post, so here I am again!
Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly post currently hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. It celebrates lovely lists, wonderful books and the bookish community. This week’s topic is Satisfying Book Series. This one was surprisingly a bit difficult for me, as I haven’t really read – or at the very least finished – too many series in the last several years. So most of this list is gonna be YA, both because I still read it pretty often even as an adult, and also because I read about half of these series that I’m about to list as a teenager.
Anyway, without further ado, let’s get started! In no particular order, here are some of my favorite book series (when I read them, at least – some of them might not hold up for adult me, lol)!
The Seven Realms by Cinda Williams Chima: Definitely one of my favorite high fantasy series – absolutely of the best I’ve ever read. I also think it’s Chima’s best work personally, considering I ended up DNF-ing her other series before I could finish them, haha.
The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins: And for this one, I mean the original trilogy – I haven’t gotten around to the standalone prequel novels yet! (It doesn’t help that I also see the prequel books as supplemental and sort of an ancillary part of the series, especially considering both came out over a decade later.) But I think that the original trilogy is a super solid set of three books; they’re some of the best written books I’ve ever read period.
Chaos Walking by Patrick Ness: I’m always gonna adore this trilogy. No crappy movie adaptation – of which I will never ever see but am unfortunately very aware of – can ruin it.
Emily Wilde Series by Heather Fawsett: This trilogy is just fantastic. It’s so well written and is such a wonderful and refreshing take on faerie stuff.
The Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer: I love fairytale retellings and this series is the pinnacle of that, and with a bit of a sci-fi twist to boot. Admittedly, I haven’t gotten around to reading the prequel novella nor the book of short stories, but again, I see them as supplemental and ancillary to the original series. And the original quadrilogy is solid.
Percy Jackson and the Olympians by Rick Riordan: What can I say – I adored these books as a teenager. Technically, this series is ongoing again, but since these five books have their own overarching-but-self-contained story and the three new books that Riordan is writing have their own overarching-but-self-contained story, I kind of consider them to be two separate things, and supplementary and companion novels to the original five books. Even if they’re technically considered part of the same series. The new books have been solid so far, though – for once I’ve actually read them, lol.
Fablehaven by Brandon Mill: I loved this when I read it like fifteen years ago, and I loved its sequel series Dragonwatch when I read it over the last few years. This is a very engaging and well-written middle grade fantasy series.
The Summoner Series by Taran Matharu: Very solidly written trilogy. It’s not super unique in regards to high fantasy, but I still enjoyed it, and it does stand out a little compared to a lot of the stuff I usually see in the YA section. It’s also one of the few series I’ve actually read and finished in the last decade, so there’s that too. Once again, I have not yet read the prequel companion book, but we all know how I feel about those by now, so I’m not gonna repeat myself. I’m thinking about re-reading this trilogy, honestly, it’s coming up on the tenth anniversary for when I read the first book and I’m feeling nostalgic.
A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas: For what it is, it’s fine. Is it the most well-written fantasy ever? No. Did it start a writing trend and genre that I hate but love making fun of? Yes. But I ate this entire series up when I read it (which was over several years, but I did read the first two books in the original years they first came out). And the original trilogy is decently solid, which is what I’m basing this list on. The novella and the Nesta book are technically supplemental.
The Darkest Powers by Kelley Armstrong: Some of her earlier work, and the only novels of hers that I’ve ever read. I liked these a lot as a teenager, even to the point of re-reading them once or twice. They’re very fast-paced, but the plot and characters aren’t sacrificed in order for the books to be that way, which is also great. I know that technically there’s another trilogy of Armstrong’s that falls under the Darkest Powers umbrella, but the two trilogies are still considered separate to a degree, so I’m going to consider them separate as well.
What are your favorite and most satisfying books series? Do you like or want to re-read them?
As always, thanks so much for reading, and I hope that you have an amazing day/night!
It’s a bit later in the month again, though nothing compared to last time I participated in this post. I mean, December 2024 was honestly ridiculous.
Anyway, Leslie @ Books Are the New Black created a fun monthly post called Birthstone Book Covers. Each month, she features book covers that are either the same color of that month’s birthstone or include the color in the title.
January has one birthstone – Garnet.
Rules:
📚 Mention the creator (Leslie @ Books Are The New Black) and link back to her so she can check out your post. 📚 Pick 5+ book covers that match the current month’s Birthstone. 📚 HAVE FUN! 📚 Nominate people if you want!
Fire by Kristin Cashore
The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness
Shadowland by Alyson Noël
Redshirts by John Scalzi
An Ember in the Ashes by Sabaa Tahir
Phantasma by Kaylie Smith
What are your favorite books with red book covers? If you participated in Birthstone Books, which books did you choose this January?
Thanks for reading, and I hope you have the most amazing day/night!
The Noise is a man unfiltered, and without a filter, a man is just chaos walking.
The Knife of Never Letting Go
This series. This. Series. Chaos Walking was such a defining trilogy of books for me in my high school years. It’s made up of three books: The Knife of Never Letting Go, The Ask and the Answer, and Monsters of Men, as well as a short prequel story called The New World.
It’s one of those series that I read again. And again. It’s one of my favorite trilogies of all time, and one I feel is still underrated. Also, there’s a shitty Lionsgate film adaptation that came out last year, based on the first book. We don’t talk about that film adaptation. Anyway, before I get into the actual review, here’s the synopsis for book one of the series.
Title & Author:The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness
Series: Chaos Walking
Length: 497 pages
Genre: Science Fiction, Dystopia, Mystery
Release Date: May 5, 2008
Book Description
A dystopian thriller follows a boy and girl on the run from a town where all thoughts can be heard – and the passage to manhood embodies a horrible secret.
Todd Hewitt is the only boy in a town of men. Ever since the settlers were infected with the Noise germ, Todd can hear everything the men think, and they hear everything he thinks. Todd is just a month away from becoming a man, but in the midst of the cacophony, he knows that the town is hiding something from him — something so awful Todd is forced to flee with only his dog, whose simple, loyal voice he hears too. With hostile men from the town in pursuit, the two stumble upon a strange and eerily silent creature: a girl. Who is she? Why wasn’t she killed by the germ like all the females on New World?
Propelled by Todd’s gritty narration, readers are in for a white-knuckle journey in which a boy on the cusp of manhood must unlearn everything he knows in order to figure out who he truly is.
Doesn’t that sound interesting? It does, doesn’t it? That’s precisely what I thought when I picked it up in the midst of a reading slump, way back in high school. And it was amazing.
The first thing you find out when yer dog learns to talk is that dogs don’t got nothing much to say.About anything.
The Knife of Never Letting Go
Todd’s narration was unique and hilarious. I mean, just look at that quote – that’s the opening line! His narrative voice was very strong, which is something that I really love in books that do that kind of thing properly. He’s one of my favorite protagonists, and is just as compelling to read about a second, or even third, time around. And I can’t forget about Manchee the doggo. He’s the absolute best boy (that can also talk!). His and Todd’s relationship is so sweet, and it makes my heart warm just writing about it right here.
Viola is the dueteragonist of the series (and the mysterious girl mentioned in the synopsis), and I liked her just as much. She and Todd are a perfect team – hers strengths cover his weaknesses, and his strengths cover her weaknesses. In several ways, the two seemed like equals. And their relationship was the central pillar that this trilogy stands on, and I absolutely loved it – it was written so perfectly.
“Here’s what I think,” I say and my voice is stronger and thoughts are coming, thoughts that trickle into my noise like whispers of truth. “I think maybe everybody falls,” I say. “I think maybe we all do. And I don’t think that’s the asking.”
I pull on her arms gently to make sure she’s listening.”I think the asking is whether we get back up again.”
The Knife of Never Letting Go
The plot also moves at a breakneck pace in all three books, but somehow there’s still time for character moments and development. I really don’t know how Ness does it. The secret that Todd’s town is hiding is also bone-chilling, and the plot twists for all three books had me at the edge of my seat.
“War is like a monster,” he says, almost to himself. “War is the devil. It starts and it consumes and it grows and grows and grows.” He’s looking at me now. “And otherwise normal men become monsters, too.”
The Knife of Never Letting Go
The first book probably did everything the best out of the three, but all of the books in the trilogy were honestly all five star reads for me. It’s an absolute understatement to say that I recommend this series.
And by this I mean, don’t just read the first book to give Chaos Walking a shot. Read the whole thing. Not the you’ll need any encouragement from me, though, once you read the ending of The Knife of Never Letting Go. You’ll want to keep going immediately – it’s just that strong of a novel. I’m not gonna spoil it, or any of the second or third books, because this series works best if you go into it blind on a first read through. (Second or third it works even though you know the plot. It’s just that good.) But yeah, I definitely recommend it, so you should definitely read it.
And if you’ve already read it, then you should read it again. And you should absolutely ignore the movie completely and pretend that it doesn’t exist, at all costs. (Someday soon, I’ll probably do a post about how much the movie sucks and why, and how it did everything wrong – down to the freaking casting even – but alas, that day is not today.)
My Star Ratings
The Knife of Never Letting Go: ★★★★★ • 5 / 5 stars
The Ask and the Answer: ★★★★★ • 5 / 5 stars
Monsters of Men: ★★★★★ • 5 / 5 stars
The New World – A Chaos Walking Short Story: ★★★★★ 5 / 5 stars
My Favorite Quotes
And because there’s just so many darn good and quotable lines in this trilogy that I like – and because I have absolutely no restraint – here’s all of my favorites from the series to end off this review. Here I go!
But a knife ain’t just a thing, is it? It’s a choice, it’s something you do. A knife says yes or no, cut or not, die or don’t. A knife takes a decision out of your hand and puts it in the world and it never goes back again.
The Knife of Never Letting Go
Men lie, and they lie to theirselves worst of all.
The Knife of Never Letting Go
Life equals running and when we stop running maybe that’s how we’ll know life is finally finished.
The Knife of Never Letting Go
It’s not that you should never love something so much that it can control you.
It’s that you need to love something that much so you can never be controlled.
It’s not a weakness.
It’s your best strength.
The Ask and the Answer
Faith with proof is no faith at all.
The Ask and the Answer
You’ve never stood on a beach as the waves came crashing in, the water stretching out from you until it’s beyond sight, moving and blue and alive and so much bigger than even the black beyond seems because the ocean hides what it contains.
The Ask and the Answer
To say you have no choice is to relieve yourself of responsibility.
Monsters of Men
A monster, I think, remembering what Ben told me once. War makes monsters of men.
Monsters of Men
“Usually when a man calls a woman a bitch,” a voice calls over from a cart pulling up near us at the edge of camp,”its because she’s doing something right.”
Monsters of Men
“It’s always darkest before the dawn, Todd.”
I look at him, baffled. “No, it ain’t! What kinda stupid saying is that? It’s always lightest before the dawn!”
Monsters of Men
“And you,” he says, “you need to talk to your boy.” He lifts my chin. “And if he needs saving, then you save him. Isn’t that what you told me you did for each other?”
I let go a few more tears but then I nod. “Over and over again.”
