My Top 3 Reads of 2018

It’s a new year, which means it’s time to share my top three reads of 2018 with you all.  Goodreads says I’ve read 37 books in 2018. It wasn’t quite as much as last year, but it’s a solid amount, especially considering how much happened. This list was made without regard to publisher, format, or author.

How I did it:  I kept track of books I liked and mentally compared one to the other. Without further delay, here’s my list.
#3 Colony Lost by Chris Philbrook: You can find my review for that book here.  This book was my at one point my favorite that I read this year. It had a slow start, but man are those characters awesome, and I just love the action in the story. Of the three, I’d want this made into a movie most. I think this is the first in a series, and if it is, I’ll be picking up the other books once the series is over.

 

 

#2 The Core by Peter V. Brett: My review for it is here. I’ve said it once, and I’ll say it again; Brett is the new master of character arc! The Core was a completely satisfying conclusion to a fantastic series. Is it on my list of top series ever? No, but I’m still glad I read it, and if you haven’t, you need to. It’s emotional. It’s full of action. It’s magic system is interesting. And those characters are amazing! I don’t know what Brett has coming next, but I’ll be in line to read it.

 

#1 The Bible New International Version by God:  I haven’t actually posted my thoughts on finishing it just yet since I’m so backlogged with reviews to write. Is this a cheat? No, while I finished the New Testament in late 2017, I finished the Old Testament in August of 2018. I wonder what readers will think of this pick. While I will post a review, I want to make a few things clear. This book well and truly changed my life. Before I started reading it, I thought it was more of a guideline. But after reading it once (and already reading through about 12 percent again, only much more carefully and this time I’m reading the ESV), I’ve come to believe this is the honest, true history of our universe. Some may choose to disagree, and you have that human right. But this book has become what I turn to in times of sadness and stress. It has amazing stories with wonderful characters. What more would someone want from a story? When I felt I was at my lowest, this book has lifted me up, and I’ll love it forever for those reasons. Will I make it #1 every year? No, because I only put books I finished in the year up, and it’ll take me into 2020 to finish it this time around. I would encourage anyone to read this. It’s fascinating. It’s structure is amazing. The characters are brilliant studies. Even if you don’t come to believe, you’ll still have done some of the greatest reading you’ll ever do.

So that’s my top three. What are yours? Why? Do you have a review you can link it to? I’d love to reblog it for you.

Thanks for reading,

Matt

Book Review: The Core by Peter V. Brett

This cover was taken from Amazon.com for review purposes. The featured image was taken from Tachyon Publications for the same reason. 

Spoiler Free Summary:  In The Core by Peter V. Brett, The stage is set for Sharak Ka, the final war against demonkind. Arlen, a man who tattooed himself with wards to fight demons; Jardir, the leader of his people and self-proclaimed Deliverer; have joined forces and entered the core, dragging a demon prince as a guide. Inevera is trying to hold Jardir’s kingdom together no matter how much it seems to want to fall apart without her husband to lead. Leesha is ready to give birth, and her child’s complicated parentage forces her to try and outwit the world. She has to do this while preparing the free cities for a war they refuse to admit is on their doorstep.   As Arlen and Jardir travel to take out the queen of all demons, the rest of the world is left alone to face the onslaught of those same demons. Killing the queen is unlikely enough without the loss of life, but can they do it before everyone they’re fighting for dies?

Character:  I’ve said it once, and I’ll say it again. Peter V. Brett is the best writer of characters and character plots in the game.  His ability to use each previous book to give more insight to specific characters makes this book that much more compelling. Every single person, no matte how much screen time, has a deep, well-developed story. This reason alone would be enough to make this my favorite book of the year (which it is), but there’s a lot to like about this book. The characters are just the unquestioned strength of the series.

Exposition: Whenever you have a multi-book series, there’s inevitably a necessary amount of exposition to help readers who haven’t read the rest of the series know what’s going on. Brett weaves most of that in through dialogue, which makes a tad of it feel forced (see below).  However, I didn’t really notice much exposition here. Some, but not so much that it bothered me.

Worldbuilding: This is the other aspect of Brett’s saga that stands out. This is an interesting world with a solid foundation of lore, magic, and demonology. There were some elements here that felt a bit like Wheel of Time in that just when you think “that guy is scary!” some other newer, more powerful monster shows up. The political intrigue is a nice bit of detail. I’m glad the story is over (I hate series that run long or never seem to end), but I hope we see this world again soon.

Portrait by Karsten Moran taken from Mr. Brett’s website.

Dialogue: When you’re characters are strong, everything else feels strong regardless of how good it actually is. As I sit here and really think about the dialogue in this book, I realized that’s where the bulk of the story’s exposition went. Characters realistically had to fill each other in, but those chunks of information were force-fed in some places. As long as the reader understands they’ll needed to get through those “info-dump” sections (I can think of three right now), the rest of the dialogue is crisp and powerful.

Description:  People who like deep, detailed description won’t think as highly of this as I do. I like my imagination to do the bulk of the heavy lifting, and Brett lets me do that. I get the details I need, and my mind takes care of the rest.  Those who want three adjectives for every noun won’t be happy though.

Overall:  The Core is (as I type this on May 28), the best book I’ve read so far in 2018. I figured it would be, but this book didn’t let me down in any way. It’s exciting, compelling, funny, and tragic. If you haven’t read this series, consider this my notification. Get this series! Read it! Great, interesting sagas with original magic systems are hard to find.   This one fits the bill.

Thanks for reading

Matt

The October Book Cover of the Month Begins

Happy first everyone! If you’re curious or new, check out the Book Covers for December, January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, and September.

November’s bracket has 31 new books. Last month’s runner up, The Festival of Trial and Ember, by Logan Miehl,  also has another chance to win the month.

You can vote all the way through the tournament, supporting the covers you like best through each round. I like to make sure people get the credit they deserve, so please show your support. Please vote and share as much as possible to get people a chance to pick their favorite.

As always, I’d appreciate it if you tag the authors and artists if you know them. I try to tag or friend every author I can, but sometimes it’s hard to track someone down. Max participation is a huge deal to me. The more people who vote, the more recognition these authors and artists receive, and I want this to be as legitimate as possible.

Image taken from Pixabay.

If you are the author, let’s remember to be good sports! 1) Please feel free to message or contact me at any time. 2) Please feel free to like, share, text, ask for support, and call everyone you know. I absolutely want max participation. However, if you’re going to offer giveaways or prizes, please offer them for voting, not just voting for you.

Also, while your summoning your army of voting soldiers, please make sure you ask them to vote in every match. Part of the idea of this is to get exposure to as many artists and authors as possible. By all means, if you can get 1,000 people to vote for your book, do it. Just please also send some eyeballs to the other matches.

A final note to authors and artists: I currently have links to the books’ Amazon pages. If you’d prefer I switch that link to sign up for your newsletter or like your social media page or whatever, just send me the link and let me know. I want this to help you. I want this to be as helpful as possible, so whatever you need me to do to facilitate that, just let me know.

Also, this will be the next to last month of the year. After November’s tournament, I’ll have been doing this for a year. (WOW!) That means the Book Cover of the Year tournament is coming. I’ll start out by having a Wild Card bracket, featuring eight covers that came close, but didn’t quite make it. Those covers will be runners up or high-vote earners. The top four from THAT bracket will be placed in the Book Cover of the Year bracket. The Book Cover of the Year Wild Card Bracket will kick off just as soon as the November Book Cover of the Month tournament ends. If you want to leave a comment for a cover you liked that didn’t get in, feel free. I’ll consider the options, though I think the ones I’m looking at now all have a justifiable right to be consider wild card entrants.

That’s still a month away. For now, please have fun with October’s bracket.

I hope you keep having fun. Please, vote, share, and discuss as much as possible.

All you have to do now is head over here to vote!

Thanks for reading,

Matt