The part where *you* tell me what you think

[lightreads]

All right, I need new book blogs to read – my favorites have either dried up and blown away, or sallied forth with sincere heart into the wasteland of young adult vampire soulmate shenanigans. And it is true of book reviews what a friend of mine says of porn – you do not get that shit on the street. So, what are your favorites? My stringently enforced criteria are:

• A blog by someone or someones who read books with words in
• A taste for speculative fiction is a plus, but not a requisite
• Passionate opinions required; my agreement with them is not
• Reviews that are not book reports – if I have to scroll through three paragraphs of plot synopsis, we’re through already
• A minimum of cats, knitting, children, cooking, alpaca-farming and other bullshit that is not about books (this is what I have twitter for)
• Blogs that are not Pat’s Fantasy Hotlist, because I loathe that one.
• Oh, and since we're on the subject, reviewers who enjoy thinking critically about texts and who have said the words "social" and "justice" in the same sentence at least once in their lives.

Go.

Comments

[rivkat]

You probably read Asking the Wrong Questions already, don't you? That's all I got.

[lightreads]

I do. I like her stuff a lot, though I frequently disagree with her.

[eagle]

Self-nomination is a little crass, but given that all of the other things you're looking for seem to be pretty much along the right lines... all my previous book reviews are on my web site, so that you can see if it's the sort of thing you would like, and there's an RSS feed (linked at the top of that page) for everything new. The Dreamwidth syndication includes all my other posts as well, but there's a review-only RSS feed that has only the book reviews.

[lightreads]

Oh, perfect, that's exactly what I was looking for.

...Y'know, I'm coming to realize my favorite book blogs are never the pro blogs with lots of arcs and contests and whatever. They're the ones that are just people like you and me who read a shit ton and can't help talking about it.

[eagle]

I'm with you -- I'm not a big fan of the pro blogs. I get my dose of professional reviews in SF from Locus and from Jo Walton's reviews at Tor.com, and all the other reviews I read are just from individual people who read a lot.

Oh, some other links, although I don't know if either come in something useful like an RSS feed (I just check the sites from time to time): SFReviews.net (who gets review copies, but otherwise feels more like a non-pro blog), and Susan Stepney's SF reviews (mostly just short, one-paragraph reactions).

[cahn]

You may already read these, but here goes, in rough order of how much I think you'd like them (from greatest to least):

http://ferretbrain.com/ has interesting reviews that are, yeah, passionate.

http://mumpsimus.blogspot.com/ has some good stuff and actually recently had a post on a class he taught on Gender and Science Fiction that I was going to link to in my LJ.

http://punkadiddle.blogspot.com/ I... don't think about books at ALL the same way he does, and rarely agree, but I find him interesting to read. Also, his Wheel of Time recaps were incredibly hilarious.

The only other one I really like is http://www.sheilaomalley.com/. She talks about all sorts of things but she has a books category. She doesn't read much SFF (the L'Engle books are pretty much it, I think) but I always enjoy hearing what she has to say, even when it turns out I loathe the book she loves, which happens.

Heh. I have Pat's Fantasy Hotlist on my RSS feed and... every time I see an article on the feed I pass right on over it. Even the titles appear to be supremely boring to me.

Um. Not that I write reviews (they're more incoherent rants, as I'm perfectly aware), so don't know if I count as sallied forth into YA dystopia blergh. If it makes you feel any better, my sister's on vacation so I've gotten a break from that stuff, though I haven't managed to post on anything else yet.

Do you have any book blogs that I ought to read? I'm always looking for more...

[lightreads]

Oh, excellent, thanks, these all look good. And I'd managed to forget about ferretbrain even though they did that great skewering of The Wise Man's Fear.

Funnily enough, you're reading all the dystopias that the cool crowd on goodreads is into. I feel like I got the best of the batch already, so I'm not really following them into that corner.

I was basically down to reading Abigail Nusbaum and those people on my flist like rivkat who review.

[cahn]

Heh, yeah -- that skewering of Wise Man's Fear was what made me start reading them.

Hm, I wonder if goodreads is where my sister gets them; I should ask. If I come across any good ones I'll of course post that, but right now they all seem determinedly first-book-oh-look-I-can-write-a-trilogy-too! mediocre (and some worse than that). I only read them because my sister wants me to.

[readerjane]

*blinks*

So... there's a whole world of blogs like that out there?

I only read yours.

Good, thoughtful reviews on occasion from blogs that are mainly cats, knitting, children -- certainly, but not solid deliverers of consistently thoughtful interaction with texts worth interacting with.

Huh. I think I've just said I miss college.

(*eagerly awaits other readers' blog recs*)

[lightreads]

Well there aren't it turns out, is the problem. Lots of "book blogs," so few I want to read. The things people think are reviews...

You know, you might really enjoy goodreads for that. It has the best community/friends sharing reviews interface of all the library sites, which is what I use it for.

[livingbyfiction.livejournal.com]

I'm trending with the dried-up folks, which is a shame because I've been reading awesome stuff. I'll try to rehydrate.

Forever Young Adult is a bunch of thirtysomethings who are frequently hilarious. The chapter-by-chapter recap of Flowers in the Attic in particular. http://www.foreveryoungadult.com

Outside of a Dog hasn't posted in forever but has wonderful archives to wander. Speculative makes up about half. http://www.steelypips.org/weblog

[lightreads]

You should do that, yes.

Oh, forever Young adult! Didn't they have that Sweet Valley High drinking game? *bookmarks*

And yeah, Outside of a Dog is good. kate_nepveu wanders by here sometimes and is great.

[firecat]

I like Jo Walton's book posts on tor.com

http://www.tor.com/community/users/bluejo

[lightreads]

Oh, yes, so do I, thanks for reminding me. It's been a while and I had to catch up.

(Which is because they don't give you a way to rss just her posts, at least not that I can find. grr stop overcontroling your content yet again Tor grr.)

[firecat]

I don't like following the whole tor feed either, so I follow bluejo and about once a month she posts a list of what she's written over there.

[vera_l]

I'm not sure if the page has an RSS feed, but if the URL to get just her posts is helpful, it's http://www.tor.com/Jo%20Walton .

A couple of other possibilities:

rushthatspeaks seems to meet your criteria very well at the moment. My only caveat is that they are about three-quarters of the way through a "read and review one new book every day for a year" project, so in September or so their DW will probably tilt back into fewer book reviews and more other stuff. I enthusiastically recommend their archives (tagged with "365 books"), though.

calico_reaction is a possibility. She's more interested in young adult vampires than I am, but reviews plenty of other stuff too. Her LJ is solely reviews and other book-reviewing-related content (anticipated schedules, book club/group discussion, etc.).

(Er, hi! *wanders awkwardly in from network page* )

[jennyrad]

I'm not completely convinced that my friend Dave's reviews meet all your criteria - in particular, although he's a top bloke in most respects, he's not as au fait with general equality issues as I'd entirely like, although can be quite sound on other social justice things. But his monthly roundups of what he's been reading meet most of your other criteria and might just tickle your interest. <a href="http://www.cantrell.org.uk/david/journal>Dave's Free Press</a>.

[lightreads]

Ooh, he's a new one on me. Thanks!

[spiffikins]

I've been following along with CalicoReaction on lj - http://calico-reaction.livejournal.com

[cyphomandra]

rushthatspeaks is reading and reviewing a book a day for a year; fascinating choices of books (fiction, nonfiction, current bestsellers and out-of-print rarities, non-English authors, etc) and great reviews, with passion and incisiveness (incisivity? Hmm. Both look wrong). My own blog is way behind on books read and taken over by earthquake, even if I didn't occasionally commit synopsis, and the only other dedicated review sites I read consistently are manga-based or British newspapers.

I'd be interested to know what ones you are reading, as for reasons I do not understand good book review blogs are remarkably tricky to track down.

[lightreads]

Oh, good one, thanks!

I'd be interested to know what ones you are reading, as for reasons I do not understand good book review blogs are remarkably tricky to track down.

Right? What is up with that? The recs above cover most things I do or did read. Outside of a Dog, though she hasn't updated in a while, and I was mostly down to bookposts by people on my flist. And goodreads, where I'm convinced all the awesome otherwise bloggers go to be awesome.