I haven’t finished the book yet, but I beg to disagree with the previous commenter about the prose being “pretentious and unreadable”. What Sarah Hall does is to give as much careful, tender attention to creating the natural setting as she does to the characters. There are odd moments where she leans toward the sentimental but most of the time I’m in awe at the old English northern world she’s rebuilt on the pages.

If you want the unreadable stuff try her “Electric Michelangelo”. And even then I wouldn’t call it pretentious, simply overeager and obstructively ornamental.

And all should try her latest book “The Carhullan Army”, released under the title “Daughters of the North” in the USA: her prose takes a complete 180 to match the bared back, roughly honed, brutal dystopian world in her book.

Terribly mediocre pap. If you’ve seen any vampire film in the last decade nothing in this book will prove to be surprising or particularly compelling.

Ugh, this wasn’t even slightly original. It’s just your regular cheesy sword & sorcery tale with some homosexuality added to add to the pretense that it’s significantly “different” than any other fantasy out there. The writing is mediocre, the dialogue often hackneyed and the overall story in desperate need of some editing. A great disappointment.

Here’s an excellent Scottish classic which should be more widely read. Hogg displays such dexterity in adapting different voices to various points of views, and combines serious commentary with a ridiculous, even ludicrous humour that makes the novel an entertaining read.

It was great to re-read it this time around after having seen the movies. Naturally the book’s scope is so much wider and deeper, and therefore a more pleasurable experience, but it was also cool to see how the movie took lines from the book and shifted it around to suit the film’s needs.

It just wasn’t a compelling read for me. Partly my fault, partly the writer’s.

It’s not bad, in parts quite good, but I enjoy Hunter’s romance for the combination of smart writing and involving romance. For the last two books there’s been a significant drop in the latter. She makes the heroes so obviously good and in love that the heroines look pretty dumb for not seeing what’s right in front of their eyes.

Showed some promise but McKillip did not deliver.

This book turned out to be some much better than expected. It’s an epistolary novel in which the last year of Julius Caesar is constructed primarily through his letters to (an invented) secluded friend Lucius Turrinus, and occasionally other figures such as his aunt, Cleopatra and Clodia Pulcher. Ideas on religion, fate, the impact of individuals and world affairs, even love are explored with a verve found in the best classics. And of course the reader’s knowledge of the Caesar’s inevitable fate lend everything a particular tension.

I have always been more interested in Augustus but Wilder has managed to make this historical figure live for me.

Another good Emma Holly after Prince of Ice. I especially loved that the gay relationship got as much focus, if not more, than the straight one. Her stories include, at their best, developed, sympathetic characters that are more emotionally complex than found in the typical romance. Also, they’re a lot of fun.