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A Drop of Corruption, Robert Jackson Bennett. This had a satisfying ending, but I didn't find it as compelling as The Tainted Cup. Still invested in Ana and Din and their very strange world, and staying along for the ride! Also amused that these books are both leviathanpunk (in the sea monster sense) and Leviathanpunk (in the Hobbes sense).
Life of Moscheles, Charlotte Moscheles. Ignaz Moscheles (1794-1870) was a composer, pianist, and conductor, who knew almost everyone who was anyone in classical music in the first half of the 19th century, including Salieri, Beethoven, Lizst, Chopin, the Schumanns, Rossini, but is particularly known as a close friend of Felix Mendelssohn. I was idly browsing the unsungcomposers.com forums, where someone mentioned that there was an entertaining biography of Moscheles by his wife, so I picked this. It does have fun tidbits, but it is also very much a Victorian biography of the sort that draws heavily on diaries and letters without doing much to investigate interesting questions like what Moscheles' relationship was with religion: he was raised Jewish, continued to practice as a young adult, but at some point converted to Anglicanism. I'm not actually sure I should have finished this rather than find a modern biography that puts the material in context, but I do plan to do the latter. Also, as you can tell from the title page where she is only named as "his wife" Charlotte is very much a self-effacing Victorian helpmeet and angel of the house, and you only get to see tiny snatches of her as a person here and there. (The book, like Moscheles, is not very generous to Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel as a composer, and at one point gets her age wrong (confusing her with Rebecka?). So while it's always pleasant to spend time with the Mendelssohn family this is not the place to look for Fanny.)
All Systems Red, Artifical Condition, Rogue Protocol, Exit Strategy, Martha Wells. I'm intrigued by the trailer for the new Murderbot TV series, which I hope lives up to its promise. In preparation, I'm rereading the books, and they're still good! (I expect I'll get more out of rereading the most recent ones, which I've only read once.) I think that part of what makes the books fun to read is that while Murderbot is a bundle of anxiety and self-blame, it is also fantastically competent at its job.
Life of Moscheles, Charlotte Moscheles. Ignaz Moscheles (1794-1870) was a composer, pianist, and conductor, who knew almost everyone who was anyone in classical music in the first half of the 19th century, including Salieri, Beethoven, Lizst, Chopin, the Schumanns, Rossini, but is particularly known as a close friend of Felix Mendelssohn. I was idly browsing the unsungcomposers.com forums, where someone mentioned that there was an entertaining biography of Moscheles by his wife, so I picked this. It does have fun tidbits, but it is also very much a Victorian biography of the sort that draws heavily on diaries and letters without doing much to investigate interesting questions like what Moscheles' relationship was with religion: he was raised Jewish, continued to practice as a young adult, but at some point converted to Anglicanism. I'm not actually sure I should have finished this rather than find a modern biography that puts the material in context, but I do plan to do the latter. Also, as you can tell from the title page where she is only named as "his wife" Charlotte is very much a self-effacing Victorian helpmeet and angel of the house, and you only get to see tiny snatches of her as a person here and there. (The book, like Moscheles, is not very generous to Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel as a composer, and at one point gets her age wrong (confusing her with Rebecka?). So while it's always pleasant to spend time with the Mendelssohn family this is not the place to look for Fanny.)
All Systems Red, Artifical Condition, Rogue Protocol, Exit Strategy, Martha Wells. I'm intrigued by the trailer for the new Murderbot TV series, which I hope lives up to its promise. In preparation, I'm rereading the books, and they're still good! (I expect I'll get more out of rereading the most recent ones, which I've only read once.) I think that part of what makes the books fun to read is that while Murderbot is a bundle of anxiety and self-blame, it is also fantastically competent at its job.