Top Ten Tuesday—the ten best books of 2021

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.

http://www.thatartsyreadergirl.com/top-ten-tuesday/

This week‘s topic / December 28: Best Books I Read In 2021

These books haven‘t necessarily been released in 2021, that‘s just when I read them… I left out all of my re-reads of Dragonriders of Pern, The Expanse, The Imperial Radch, etc. etc.:

Rovers by Richard Lange — A horror book with a different take on vampires. Of Mice and Men with vampires and a biker gang. 

Shards of Earth (The Final Architects Trilogy, #1) by Adrian Tchaikovsky — Space opera with a touch of The Expanse and Babylon 5, with a great ensemble cast on a scrappy scavenger ship, fighting against the odds and pretty much everything else. The proverbial underdogs against the universe.

Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir — Mark Watney in space! And he sciences the sh*t out of his situation… so, yes, very much reminiscent of The Martian. And then some. I loved it and could barely put it down. So much fun! 

The Prefect (Prefect Dreyfus Emergency, #1) by Alastair Reynolds — On the surface this comes along as a police procedural in a SF setting. Dreyfus is a cop with a strong moral code of right and wrong, committed to justice. My first association was Miller from The Expanse, with a bit of Blade Runner and minus any projectile weapons. Space opera, ultimately, with the many and very varied habitats of the Glitter Band, artificial intelligences, body modifications, uplifted mammals, many political systems, states of being and an elaborate polling system — fascinating! 

David Mogo, Godhunter by Suyi Davies Okungbowa — Gods have rained down on Lagos, the capital of Nigeria. We enter the story some time later, into the dystopian society that has developed here in the aftermath. David Mogo, our 1st person narrator, is a demi-god working as an illegal godhunter. An old wizard with dubious morals sends David Mogo off to catch two high gods, Taiwo and Kehinde. David is in need of money to fix his roof, so off he goes, despite his misgivings about this wizard. Obviously things don’t go as expected. 

Fugitive Telemetry (The Murderbot Diaries, #6) by Martha Wells — Muderbot is back in novella length. Snark and sarcasm abound. Just another crazy day, tracking down a murderer and making sure one’s humans don‘t come to harm. All the stars.

Leviathan Falls (The Expanse #9) by James S.A. Corey — A well done ending to the series. I did not expect it to go into the direction it did, so that was satisfying. It ends bittersweet, with some sadness, but also hope.

Revelation (Matthew Shardlake, #4) by C.J. Sansom — Historically pretty sound, as far as I can tell. Very homogenous. Full of suspense towards the end, could not put it down anymore. The murders are gruesome and reminiscent of a famous 90s movie. With the context of Henry VIII, his dissolution of the monasteries and the religious upheaval of that time it works well.

Wild Sign (Alpha & Omega, #6) by Patricia Briggs — The FBI shows up at the doorstep of Anna and Charles and asks for help. A village in the mountains has disappeared and something potentially evil lurks in the woods.

The Whale Library by Zidrou,  Judith Vanistendael — Pretty watercolours, a mature story about a whale who contains a large library, a postman delivering sea mail, his wife and a smattering of sailors, pirates, fish, sea turtles, octopi and more…

Besides this one I also read some very good more traditional graphic novels. But that probably needs another entry…

Wrapping up that challenge…

I don‘t think I will adding anything else to this challenge, so here is a round-up of the #ReadBIPOC2021 challenge. I finally turned to some books that had lingered much too long on my TBR already and discovered something new as well. Definitely a good challenge

Reading Writers of Color 2021

January: Bloodchild — Becoming — https://lonelycryptidmedia.com/2020/1…

My first Octavia Butler and it was good. Butler voices her surprise in the afterword, that readers see this as a story of slavery. But are we looking at symbiosis or at a parasitic relationship? Is it really consent in a situation, where your personal rights have been curtailed and there are no equal rights? I think not. Interesting. And worth reading. 

I also enjoyed the audiobook narrated by Michelle Obama. I watched a short documentary with her about the Becoming booktour as well. Obviously she has a lot of important things to say about empowerment, education, equal rights—you name it—, but my primary interest really was to get to know her a little better and look behind the facade. Reading about the banana yellow car of her husband, for example. Or about going to couple‘s counseling. And I enjoyed the ride quite a bit, up until the part where she and her husband embarked on their presidential campaign. 

February: The Story of Human Language  — https://lonelycryptidmedia.com/2021/0…
It was interesting, even with some bits in between that dragged a bit. The accompanying pdf was open most of the time, while I listened to the lectures. Good enough to consider further offerings by The Great Courses.

March: David Mogo, Godhunter — https://lonelycryptidmedia.com/2021/0…
One of the 5-star reads of 2021. Let‘s call it Godpunk. Gods have rained down on Lagos, the capital of Nigeria. We enter the story some time later, into the dystopian society that has developed here in the aftermath. David Mogo, our 1st person narrator, is a demi-god working as an illegal godhunter. This is really 3 novellas stuck together. I learned a lot about Nigeria and Lagos, looking up something or other frequently.

April: Dawn — Elatsoe — https://lonelycryptidmedia.com/2021/0…

My second visit with Octavia E. Butler. I liked Bloodchild, but Dawn didn‘t work for me. Struggling with consent issues again. The book hasn‘t aged well. The plot felt too simplistic, there was no real suspense, no great twists or massive surprises.

Elatsoe came recommended by a friend. Yes, it‘s Young Adult, not my favourite genre. But it looked interesting. Author and female main character are Lipan Apache. And while I didn‘t bite my nails, the story was not bad and the writing was good. Essentially it‘s UF/magical realism, set in our place and time, with ghosts, vampires and fae added to the mix. My favourite gadget: instant teleportation via fae ring.

June: A Dead Djinn in Cairo — The Haunting of Tram Car 015 — A Master of Djinn — The Murders of Molly Southbourne — Farmhand, Vol. 1: Reap What Was Sown — Marvel’s Voices: Indigenous Voices #1 — https://lonelycryptidmedia.com/2021/0…

The month of by P. Djèlí Clark. Great stuff. Egypt, Cairo, Djinns, ghuls, sorcerers, magic, airships, gas light, aerial trams… steampunk plus electricity. A fun universe.

Molly Southbourne was weird, disturbing, creepy. Slightly disgusting in parts. It was like a train wreck—pretty horrible, but I couldn‘t look away. The writing is very good though. I was totally immersed in the story, the characters and Molly‘s world.

Both comics were good, if not Earth shattering..

July: Dominion: An Anthology of Speculative Fiction from Africa and the African Diaspora — https://lonelycryptidmedia.com/2021/0…
Reading this anthology took a while. It is a very strong anthology. Even the stories that didn‘t fully grab me gave me plenty to think about. Recommended! 

August: Rosewater — https://lonelycryptidmedia.com/2021/0…
My second Tade Thompson of the year. An alien lands on Earth, burrows into the ground and presents as a illuminated dome. A shanty town develops around it. Eventually there is a opening through which something escapes and heals people. A city called Rosewater springs up around the alien dome, benefitting from these regular healings. We follow Kaaro, a „sensitive“, in the employ of some shady secret agency. I can appreciate the inventive world building, but the rest was a slog. The whole thing felt pretty pointless to me and I actively disliked Kaaro.

October: Was weiße Menschen nicht über Rassismus hören wollen – non-fiction — https://lonelycryptidmedia.com/2021/0…
Alice Hasters is a German journalist, writing about institutionalized racism in Germany, drawing from her own experiences growing up in Cologne. I don‘t think this book has been translated into English. The title would be: What white people don’t want to hear about racism (but should know). I liked the book. Hasters writes well, narrates well, gives good examples and presents her arguments objectively. The book doesn‘t delve deeply into the topic and is surprisingly non-critical. Quiet a short piece, a bit on the shallow side. A good starting point.

Sorry for not linking it all properly, I felt a bit lazy… Anyway, good challenge, I enjoyed taking part and had fun researching books for the various prompts. I found a few authors that I plan to pick up again.

Did you take part in any entertaining challenges this year? Which challenges are you planning to takle next year?

Nigerian Godpunk

David Mogo, Godhunter
by Suyi Davies Okungbowa

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Rating: 4.5 out of 5.

A new take on classic Urban Fantasy—Godpunk? 

Gods have rained down on Lagos, the capital of Nigeria. We enter the story some time later, into the dystopian society that has developed here in the aftermath. David Mogo, our 1st person narrator, is a demi-god working as an illegal godhunter. An old wizard with dubious morals sends David Mogo off to catch two high gods, Taiwo and Kehinde. David is in need of money to fix his roof, so off he goes, despite his misgivings about this wizard. Obviously things don’t go as expected. 

This was the first part in a book that reads like three novellas collected in one volume, with a red thread running through them and each connected closely in terms of time, location and characters. Enjoyable, even though I never really connected with David Mogo on an emotional level.

I looked up a lot about Nigeria, the orishas, Nigerian Pidgin, a lot of vocabulary, food items, clothing styles, etc. Then I was looking up info about Lagos, Victoria Island, Makoko, and, and, and… all this kept slowing down my reading speed, as I kept going off on tangents and looking something up almost constantly… My kind of fun!

I struggled a bit with the Nigerian Pidgin used in some of the dialogues, but decided to just go with it — I hope I managed to get the gist of the conversations. 

Interesting article in the Guardian about the floating city of Makoko:
https://www.theguardian.com/cities/20…

Bottomline: I had fun, my imagination got engaged, I learned a lot of new things, I enjoyed the writing. I would read more by this author.

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Part of my #ReadPOC2021 challenge. I read this for the March prompt, „A Work of Fiction“. 

Post about the March prompt: https://lonelycryptidmedia.com/2021/0…
Main challenge: https://lonelycryptidmedia.com/2020/1…

From the author‘s website: (slightly amended)
Suyi Davies Okungbowa is a Nigerian author of fantasy, science fiction and other speculative works inspired by his West-African origins. His new epic fantasy trilogy, The Nameless Republic, is forthcoming from Orbit, beginning in May 2021 with Son of the Storm. His highly-anticipated debut, the godpunk fantasy novel David Mogo, Godhunter, won the 2020 Nommo Ilube Award for Best Speculative Novel by an African. Learn more at suyidavies.com.

I received this free e-copy from the publisher/author via NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review, thank you!