July reads: Mini reviews of Children of the Mind (Card), Howl's Moving Castle (Jones), Mechanical Failure (Zieja) and The Well of Ascension (Sanderson)

First book of the month was Children of the Mind, the fourth book in the Ender Quartet from Orson Scott Card. This series has been quite a surprise as I was never expecting it to be as good as it has been. The previous book in the series, Xenocide, is my current book of the year, so this one had a tough act to follow. The plot from the previous two books reaches a conclusion here, and the characters that made a surprising re-appearance at the end of Xenocide are at the front of this one, as everyone tries to focus on stopping the impending destruction of their planet and saving those around them. The series is definitely a single book followed by a trilogy, as Ender's Game is not like the other three, except for in its final section, but they are all, at worst, very good books. This one didn't grab me quite as much as Xenocide did, and I probably preferred Speaker over this one too, however it is marginal. It is another very thought provoking look at life, consciousness, who should or should not have power over other sentient species, family, love, new beginnings... Again, a lot of themes and all an intriguing and enjoyable read. Anyway, the Ender Quartet... what a series. It is up there amongst my favourites of all time.

I fancied a considerable change of pace for my next book, choosing Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones from my daughter's bookshelf. I love the cover art of the book (which you can see ), I've always been intrigued by the Studio Ghibli movie based on the book (yet to watch it though, but I've got it, waiting to be watched in some archaic, defunct media called DVD?), and from having seen quite a few other Ghibli movies and loved them for their different style of film and story compared to most commercial Hollywood animated movies, once the idea was in my head I just had to read the book to see what a book that Ghibli and Miyazaki decided to base a movie on was like. It's about an eldest sister, Sophie, who is cursed by a witch and ends up living with a mysterious and strange wizard called Howl who has a castle that keeps moving around all the time. This is very accessible for children, but has a charm that I think can make it enjoyable for adults alike. I'd read a lot of praise for DWJ that I maybe had my expectations set a little too high for this book and thought there'd be a bit more in the grown up elements in there, but things like the evil in the story, it isn't fleshed out, it is just the character is evil and does evil things. That lack of depth was perhaps a bit disappointing, but nonetheless overall the book was an enjoyable, imaginative, magical story over it's 302 pages, that you know is going to wrap up nicely at the end.

The sci-fi comedy book Mechanical Failure! by Joe Zieja was up next. This is the first book in the Epic Failure series. R. Wilson Rogers ends up being re-enlisted into the military during a two hundred years (and counting) peacetime. He figures it is probably the safest place for him, as nobody in the military actually expects to fight or shoot things. But things are different now, there are more droids around, more rules, more procedure and a lot less alcohol than he remembered. The book is fun, silly and almost slapstick in humour. The story is entertaining and in general moves on at a decent rate. It's the sort of book I could see being serialised as a sitcom TV show. Some humour types become quite repetitive though, as there are quite a number of bits like one paragraph ending "and the only way things could get worse is if XYZ happened" for example, and then the next paragraph starts "What do you mean XYZ happened?". Some bits elicited a chuckle, others an eye-roll. It was a very easy read over its 343 pages, nothing too complex in prose or content, and characters that don't stray too far from being one-dimensional. But nonetheless, I enjoyed the book. It wasn't amazing, but if in the right frame of mind for silly humour, there were more hits than misses.

The Well of Ascension by Brandon Sanderson, book two in the Mistborn series was chosen next, and it clocked in at a rather beefy 763 pages. Continuing on from where the first book left us, this book follows the unforeseen consequences of the group's actions in the first book and the realisation that the Lord Ruler may have been doing more than he was given credit for. I'm quite enjoying these books; they are not amazing, but have been a solid 4/5 sort of book. They've been entertaining, the plot has had twists and surprises, the characters have been interesting; there's been a lot to like. However, there are places that it feels like Sanderson thinks, "why use 10 words, when 1000 will do" and other times where, like with the first book, there's clear hints about how or why something will happen, then it happens, and afterwards a character goes at length to explain to another character how or why it happened, adding in further detail on it so that it is even more fully and clearly explained. The over explanation is a bit frustrating at times. Regardless, while I'm not a fan of lengthy books, about 400 pages is my optimum page count, I have enjoyed reading this one, but I'm not ready to even consider The Stormlight Archive quite yet!