2024
Titles and names are listed as they were in the edition I read. So some titles and names are translated.
Key: Title – Author – Date finished; format – language read in – genre – source
Hella – Alena Machoninová – 4.5.2024
physical – CZ – literary / non-fiction – library
[ REVIEW UPCOMING ]
Chladné břehy – Sergej Lukjaněnko (tr. Pavel Weigel) – 25.4.2024
physical – CZ – fantasy – owned
Disclaimer: I bought this book in around 2018 at a library sale for 50Kč. I am not supporting Lukyanenko and especially not what he said about Ukraine.
The thief Illmar escapes a prison transport with a mysterious young noble boy (and the involuntary help of a certain aviatrix). After they part ways, Illmar wants to lie low. But that turns out impossible because the boy stole something with massive implications for the very foundations of the Empire and Church, who will stop at nothing to find him or anyone who might even know anything.
When I bought this I was really into Night Watch, and honestly over the years I had this on my shelf and did not read it, I expected it to be disappointing. It was not. I enjoyed reading this book.
I really liked some of the alternate history worldbuilding especially the alt-Christianity religion(s) and the various consequences of the rarity of iron. The social and historical consequences the Word (the magic system) were also interesting. I on principle dislike historical figures way after the point of divergence appearing in alternate history settings though. (You really expect me to believe that in a world where Jesus was completely different (let alone all the magic), Moliére still wrote Tartuffe and Suvorov still brought the cannons over the Alps?)
Olga Hepnarová: Zabíjela, protože neuměla žít – Roman Cílek – 6.4.2024
physical – CZ – true crime – library
Talking about true crime is difficult, especially because I am usually not a true crime person, and find some parts of it ethically dubious at best.
This book mainly presents documents and testimony from the investigation of the crime. I think it is fact-based and relatively respectful. There are many editions of this book, I just picked up the one they had at the closest library, which is the 2010 one.
Olga Hepnarová is really interesting to me for multiple reasons as a product of the normalisation communist era and as a person with whom I have multiple similarities in demographic. I empathize with her in a certain way, but that does not explain her crime, in fact it makes it even less understandable and more heinous.
It is hard to draw any conclusions from reading this much information about her other than this is all so horrible. I think she is part of the same social trend (split across the Iron Curtain) that ended up producing school shooters. I think in a way I also read this book because I thought it could help me make sense of things like the school shooting that happened here in December, but it didn't.
Delicious in Dungeon vol. 3 – Kui Ryoko (tr. #EverydayHeroes Scans) – 1.4.2024
online / manga – EN – fantasy – MangaDex
I got ahead of my manga reading in watching the anime, so I am not sure if I will read more or just watch. This volume was (surprise) also amazing. After the school flashback I definitely get why people ship Falin and Marcille.
Delicious in Dungeon vol. 2 – Kui Ryoko (tr. #EverydayHeroes Scans) – 28.3.2024
online / manga – EN – fantasy – MangaDex
Dungeon Meshi continues to be extremely good. I really like this story's take on orcs. The part with Chilchuck and the mimic is also really good. There are a few panels with very noticably 3D model backgrounds, but over all the art is excellent.
Sandman: Lovci snů – Neil Gaiman, P. Craig Russell (tr. Viktor Janiš) – 25.3.2024
comic – CZ – fantasy – libaray
Very slowly approaching total Sandman completion (at least for the trades in Czech). This story was nice in a fairytale way and the art was beautiful, but over all it didi not leave a particularly deep impression.
Božský imperátor Duny – Frank Herbert (tr. Veronika Volhejnová) – 20.3.2024
physical – CZ – sci-fi – library
[ REVIEW UPCOMING ]
The Northern Caves – nostalgebraist – 14.3.2024
online – EN – horror? – AO3
I don’t know what my policy was on web serials here, mostly because I tend to not finish them. The Northern Caves is a web serial by notable tumblr user and GPT early adopter nostalgebraist. I read about a half of his previous work Floornight some time ago. He also has another later work on AO3 that I might read at some point.
To compare TNC to one book I have read and one I haven't, it's basically An Unauthorised Fan Treatise meets House of Leaves.
The stroy starts off really interesting, with a group of mid 2000's forum dwellers trying to analyze the insane ramblings of a cult children's author and revealing his destructive cult-like philosophy. The ending is disappointing - all of the atmosphere building leads to offscreen ambiguous underwhelming events. And a final chapter that is a weak and redundant meta commentary on the story.
Delicious in Dungeon vol. 1 – Kui Ryoko (tr. #EverydayHeroes Scans) – 1.3.2024
online / manga – EN – fantasy – MangaDex
I don't know if I logged manga that I read on scan sites before. I am doing that now.
Dungeon Meshi was one of those mangas I would see people post occasionally and think I should read it sometime, but I didn't. Now it is all over everywhere because of the anime so I finally read it.
There is not much I can say about Dungeon Meshi that others have not said already: the dugeon worldbuilding is creative, the characters are funny, the food looks delicious.
The Stone Sky – N.K. Jemisin – 29.2.2024
physical – EN – fantasy / sci-fi – owned
I finally read the last book in a series I like!!! This should not be that difficult. Prague's Bargain Books actually deliver on the Bargain in their name for the first time as I bought this for 99 Kč.
What a deeply impacting ending this is. The relationships of Nassun and Essun and indeed the relationship between them that ends up so important at the end are so interesting. And we finally get to find out the origin of the stone eaters and see a bit earlier in the eternal cycle of violence and hate that is life on the (Not-So-)Evil Earth.
Sakamoto Days 1: Legendární zabiják – Júto Suzuki (tr. Anna Křivánková) – 20.2.2024
manga – CZ – comedy / action – library
I was with my mum at the library / café and borrowed this because it was the only manga they had the first volume of at that location and I wanted something to read. It was fun. Not sure if I'll read more volumes in the future.
Twenty Fragments of a Ravenous Youth – Xiaolu Guo (tr. Rebecca Morris, Pamela Casey) – 26.1.2024
physical – EN – literary fiction – owned
I bought this for store credit a year ago kind of at random, because it was relatively cheap within the category of foreign literature and it seemed like a book a cool literature enjoyer type would read.
This books consists of well… 20 fragments of the life of Fenfang, a 21-year-old in Beijing trying to make her way as an actress, scriptwriter, and a single young woman in a society that’s not OK with that.
In the second fragment, a flashback to her arriving to Beijing at 17, Fenfang watches a mother and daughter get ran over in front of their house and then decides to take advantage of the free house and moves in. This does not set the tone for the rest of the novel, which follows much more mundane miseries.
I think as a westerner reading this, many people's instict is to think about what this says about China. The author is an emigrant. I think any story you write (or in this case rewrite) in exile in some way reflects why you left. And saying China is not a great country to live in for many people is not exactly an earth-shattering revelation.
I more viewed this as a being in your 20's coming-of-age story. I feel like the frustration of being a young woman in society hostile to your independence is really easy to connect to despite the wide difference in everything else.
Praktičtí lidé – Christian Morgenstern (tr. Jana Pokojová, Jan Janula) – 21.1.2024
physical – CZ – poetry – library
This is a collection of Morgenstern’s more wordplay-based poetry, also featuring the reocurring poetry characters of Misters Palmström and Korf (I wonder if someone ships them).
The translators admitted they changed a lot of stuff, but they have the license to that here, since the poems are so based on wordplay. Also I just think localization is cool and based.
The silly tone of the poems is strangely contrasted by horror-style illustrations by Karolína Žitná, which are actually really nice, but maybe not for this collection.
Na Zemi jsme na okamžik nádherní – Ocean Vuong (tr. Martin Světlík) – 16.1.2024
physical – CZ – literary fiction – library
When I read Night Sky With Exit Wounds I said I will pay for the next book I'll read by Vuong – I didn't, this is from the library.
I immidiately realised my mistake when I checked this out. Why are you reading the translated version, he is a poet, you are losing the language (ironically)! Luckily, it turns out the Czech translation is good. Maybe a further alienation of the language works with the theme of the alienation of language. The translated 50 Cent lyrics are funny as fuck though.
This book speaks about immigrant and family and poverty trauma in a really raw and powerful way. Aesthetically the way it engages with American-ness is reminiscent of Ethel-Cain vibes Tumblr. The language can be overwrought sometimes, though.
I tried googling what Czech Vietnamese people are saying about this (if you don't know there is a surprisingly large Vietnamese minority here). I could not find anything (maybe I just suck at searching), but I found this article about the lack of CZ Vietnamese authors that is interesting.
Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You – Scotto Moore – 8.1.2024
ebook – EN – horror/sci-fi – ???
I did not intend to have this be my first book of the year, but I found this in my large unread books and pdfs folder while going to read a different book (that hopefully you will see here soon) and this one is short and fast-paced.
I don’t know if I paid for this or if I pirated it. If I did not pay for it, sorry. The author may or may not be a person I follow on Tumblr? If he is then extra apologies. I may just have found this book through random selection on some other website though.
Set in a fantasy world where music reviewers with tumblr blogs are relevant, this long-titled book follows one such music critic who becomes obsessed with a mysterious song he finds online. Other songs and signs of the apocalypse follow.
This is very written by a certain type of guy, with the eldritch monstrosities, an array of semi-interchangable alt girls, and of course the focus on hyper-obscure indie music.
The premise is interesting and the story is fast-paced, but over all the plot goes to a pretty stupid place and in the end gives the reader nothing special.
Sandman: Předehra – Neil Gaiman (art J.H. Williams III, Dave Stewart) (tr. Viktor Janiš) – 4.1.2024
comic – CZ – fantasy/sci-fi – library
This is the grand prequel to the Sandman series, showing what epic struggles caused Dream to be weak enough to be able to be captured by a Crowley wannabe.
The art especially is breath-taking in all aspects. Especially interesting for the story is the approach to the nonlinear sections. I also want to appreciate the surreal (heh) panel layouts and the wonderful designs of the alternate Sandmen. The art in general is so fucking beautiful.
Speaking of designs, Dream having flames on his cloak now is weird. He did not have those before, right?
I really loved the reveal with Desire here as this story adds more layers to her strained relationship with Dream. Also catboygirl Desire rules.
Also super weird to think of the Endless as having parents.