Old enough for fairy tales: A reading update

I find it amusing when certain commonalities or themes unintentionally appear in my reading lists. This time around, we have several mysteries in confined spaces (a couple of trains, a submarine, and some locked rooms), some Iranian family drama (both real and fictional), and a good percentage of first-person narratives (ranging from memoirs to YA to sci-fi).

For those of you with short attention spans, or busy lives, I'm listing my top three new books below. I also reread Phoenix Rising and The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, which will always be favorites of mine, and which you should definitely read if you haven't already.

• Non-fiction: Funny in Farsi was an amusing and engaging memoir of growing up in America in an Iranian family. I was also glad to have read it when I ended up reading YA fiction about a similar family later on - the first book added depth to my understanding of the second.
• Fiction: The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet was a fun space opera with amazing worldbuilding and awesome characters. I've discovered a lot of good new books recently, but none that have brought me quite as much joy as this one did.
• Honorable mention: The Language of Thorns was beautiful both visually and textually, with the art and the stories twining together to create something dark and lovely. It definitely wins at being the most aesthetically pleasing book on this list.

Now for the more detailed reviews...

46. Night Train to Rigel, by Timothy Zahn

If you're looking for a fun sci-fi detective adventure, with a fascinating villain and galaxy-wide stakes, this book might do it for you. Is it great literature? Not really, but it's entertaining. Are most of Zahn's narrators fairly interchangeable? Yes, but that works for me since I like the type. Do the plot twists make sense? Mostly, and more so on a reread, which this was for me. There's a lot of heavy sci-fi out there, and while I love that too, sometimes I'm in the mood for something that's easy to jump in and out of. I'm also a fan of thrillers that take advantage of confined spaces - in this case, a train that traverses the galaxy.   My rating: 8/10

47. Funny in Farsi, by Firoozeh Dumas

This was an interesting and entertaining look at one immigrant's experience coming to America. It's basically a series of individual stories, not necessarily in chronological order, and I appreciated the short chapters, since I could read them one at a time in the little bits of free time I had. The author is good at relating fun stories, and also provides some fascinating insights into Americans' responses to people from other countries. Her family came from Iran, so there were definite cultural differences, and also some hostility, especially during the Iran hostage crisis, but she approaches everything with a keen sense of humor in writing the memoir, which makes for an enjoyable read. My rating: 9/10

48. Exit Strategy, by Martha Wells

This book did a wonderful job of pulling together the pieces from the previous entries in the series and bringing everything to a satisfying conclusion, while still leaving things open for more adventures in this universe. (Side note: I am very excited for Network Effect next year!) Murderbot's character development over this series was excellent, and I enjoyed the interactions with the returning characters from the first book, particularly Mensah. The action sequences were deftly handled, and I was definitely reading with raised eyebrows for a large portion of the book - my family has always teased me about this habit when the story I'm reading gets intense.   My rating: 9/10

49. Phoenix Rising, by Karen Hesse

Lessons this book taught me that have stayed with me for twenty years: 1) Sometimes bad things happen, but life goes on in the middle of them. 2) Love can be painful, but it also makes life worthwhile. 3) Hold your people close, and never take them for granted. I know these aren't new ideas, but they're important pieces of living life well, and as a kid, this book was responsible for really bringing these lessons home for me. The writing is straightforward, and the main character's personality is very similar to mine at that age, which helped younger me connect with the story. At this point, I'm not capable of rating this book objectively, but I figure anything that's played such an important role in my approach to life deserves all the love.   My rating: 10/10

50. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, by C.S. Lewis

I love these books, and I've previously reviewed the physical version of this book, but I had a couple of thoughts while listening to the audiobook. First, there's so much history that happens between The Magician's Nephew and this book, history that we only ever get hints of, and occasionally contradictory hints at that - a major difference between Lewis and Tolkien. Second, Michael York's narration was a little disappointing, especially the various accents he used for most of the nonhuman characters. Thankfully, there isn't a ton of dialogue in this book, and York's reading style was fine for everything else. 7/10 for the narration, but the story itself is still as excellent as ever.   My rating: 10/10

51. Wild, by Cheryl Strayed

I really liked the parts of this book that talked about the author's time actually on the Pacific Crest Trail, and I definitely understood how being out in the wilderness like that could help you put things in perspective. That's one of the reasons I did a lot of backpacking and canoeing in college, when my life was a mess - there's something about getting away from everything and pushing yourself physically that helps mentally and emotionally. That being said, the author is a very different person than I am, and I was annoyed by some of her behavior off the trail.   My rating: 8/10

52. The Magicians, by Lev Grossman

I love the show and expected to really like the books as well, but this first one just didn't measure up. My main issue with this book isn't that it's dark - the show is, if anything, even darker - but that it's not weird enough. Dark and weird is wonderful, dark without sufficient amounts of weird is just depressing. The worldbuilding is fascinating, and I love the concept, but the execution leaves something to be desired. Also, there's way too much Quentin and not nearly enough of anyone else. Especially Eliot. More Eliot, please.   My rating: 7/10

53. The Language of Thorns, by Leigh Bardugo

Well, this was gorgeous and dark and beautiful. You could see the influence of various traditional fairy tales on these new stories, but they were never just retellings. Every tale felt new and old at the same time, taking something familiar and turning it on its head, and in the process ending up with something that felt more true and real. Combine that with the way these stories flowed nicely out of the fictional cultures that served as their Grishaverse origins, and the amazing illustrations that grew as the tales unfolded, and this book is probably my favorite thing to come out of Leigh Bardugo's world so far.    My rating: 9/10

54. The Improbable Adventures of Sherlock Holmes,

       edited by John Joseph Adams
The quality of the stories here varied quite a bit from one to the next, and I was hoping for some more supernatural stories, but I still enjoyed this collection overall. Also, I was amused by the realization that the particular version of Sherlock I envisioned as I read the stories changed depending on each author's style, although there wasn't any correlation between which version of the character I saw and how much I liked the story. My two favorite stories were The Singular Habits of Wasps and A Study in Emerald, both of which leaned heavily in the direction of the improbable, and both of which incorporated some very clever storytelling.  My rating: 8/10

55. Five Children and It, by E. Nesbit

It's always interesting to me to return to books I enjoyed as a kid but haven't read in years, especially books that were old even when I first read them. This is a cute story, although somewhat overly moralistic at times. The idea of one wish per day, the effect of which only lasts until sunset, provides a nice framework for stringing together a variety of adventures. I particularly like how grouchy the Psammead is, and how the children's wishes never work out as expected, so they're constantly ending up in some sort of predicament.  My rating: 7/10

56. Ice Station Zebra, by Alistair MacLean

This is one of my favorites of MacLean's books. I've always enjoyed a good submarine story; the confined space and unique dangers raise the stakes and increase the tension. The narrator here knows things the reader doesn't and only reveals them slowly, which irks me a little, but at least the narrator is honest about the fact that he's not telling the whole truth. The reveals themselves work well to advance the underlying mystery that drives the book, and there's a nice variety in the obstacles our heroes face. I'll admit to being somewhat amused by the outdated technology, especially since some of it is central to the story, but that doesn't stop me from enjoying this book for what it is: an excellent thriller from the Cold War era.   My rating: 9/10

57. A Very Large Expanse of Sea, by Tahereh Mafi

I'm sort of on the fence here. I liked the writing style, and I liked that this was from a significantly underrepresented point of view in YA fiction. On the other hand, there wasn't much plot aside from the romantic stuff, and while the romance was very true to how teenagers think and act, I haven't been a teenager in a while. To be honest, teenage me would probably have loved this book. Adult me still likes romance, but I prefer something a little less childish.  My rating: 7/10

58. The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet, by Becky Chambers

There was so much to love about this book - the characters, the worldbuilding, the storytelling, and the way all of those elements built on each other to make a brilliant book. I loved that we saw the world from so many points of view, and that each of those points of view was unique, and informed by that person's culture and history and personality. I loved the depth of the worldbuilding, and the way it wasn't just there as interesting background, but was played out in each person's way of approaching the world. And I loved the characters - especially Sissix, Ashby, and Dr. Chef, but they all felt like real people, with thoughts and feelings that were a beautiful blend of familiar and alien. It's been a while since I came across a book that was as hard to put down as this one, and it made me ridiculously happy.  My rating: 10/10

59. Murder on the Orient Express, by Agatha Christie

I hadn't read this book in years - long enough that I'd forgotten a good number of the little details, which made revisiting it that much more enjoyable. The murder mystery here is very clever, and even knowing the solution, it's a challenge to catch all the pieces that point to it. Poirot is a fun character - he's smart and he knows it - and some of his interactions with both the suspects and his fellow investigators are highly amusing. I would also be remiss if I didn't mention the absolutely outstanding narration for this audiobook - Dan Stevens does such an excellent job giving each character a unique voice, and has basically the perfect reading voice.   My rating: 9/10

60. The Psychology of Everyday Things, by Donald A. Norman

This book made me feel better about the many times I've pushed rather than pulled on doors, or had trouble lighting the correct burner on my stove. It was also interesting to think about the author's predictions and suggestions in light of the various technological advances of the last thirty years. I am definitely curious about the revised and expanded version that was published in 2013, because the original 1988 version is a blend of concepts that still make sense today and ones that seem quite out of place in today's world, combined with examples that are still very relevant and ones that are so dated as to be almost laughable.   My rating: 7/10