Rakevat’s Rules of Chaos (original) (raw)

Pahua and the Dragon’s Secret, by Lori M. Lee – In the second book of this series, Pahua Moua, the reincarnation of the great Hmong warrior Shee Yee, wants to enroll in a school for shamans. In order to do so, she has to reinforce the prison of Xov, the god of destruction, which means finding metal in the Land of Dragons. The dragons in this story are creatures of water. It’s a good adventure story, and I enjoy the character of Miv, the sarcastic cat spirit who accompanies Pahua.

Nine Goblins, by T. Kingfisher – This novella is set in a fantasy world with a lot of the normal types of beings found in such beings, like elves, trolls, unicorns, and of course goblins. The nine goblins of the title are a rather incompetent military regiment in the war against humans and elves, and are sent far away from the battlefield by a wizard. There’s some commentary on goblin culture, how they complain all the time, but to them it’s a sign of affection. An elven veterinarian called Sings-to-Trees is also a major character. I feel like there wasn’t a whole lot of plot, but the characters and settings were interesting, and there were a lot of both funny and poignant observations throughout.

Legends & Lattes: A Novel of High Fantasy and Low Stakes, by Travis Baldree – This is a rather cozy story set in a sword-and-sorcery world. Viv is an orc who’s a fierce fighter and a member of a band of roving adventurers, but desires to settle down and open a coffee shop. In this world, coffee is an invention of the gnomes, as are household heating and cooling systems. It’s interesting to me that I recently read another book where a fantasy kingdom had a bunch of coffee shops, although there it’s more of a recurring joke than a major focus. With help from some new friends, Viv’s shop develops into a popular business, and gradually gains baked goods, entertainment, and students who hang out there. She also runs afoul of the local mob and is betrayed by one of her former companions, but things work out all right in the end. It has a similar feel to the Discworld books where Ankh-Morpork is introduced to a concept from our world, although the writing style is different. Viv’s baker is a rattkin, a species that comes from fantasy role-playing, including in Octopath Traveler, which I’m playing now. It also has a lot of dire animals, and Viv employs a dire cat to guard the shop. Baldree DID work as a video game designer for a while, but not on that particular game. The orc’s partner is a succubus, whose power of attraction is not limited to the sexual variety. And I assume Rackam, the leader of Viv’s band, is named after the illustrator Arthur Rackham. A bonus short story in the second edition, “Pages to Fill,” explains how Viv first discovered coffee. I personally don’t like coffee, but I feel I’ve said that so many times that someone could make a supercut of it.

Bookshops & Bonedust – This was written as a prequel to Legends & Lattes, and I actually read it first, but for some reason it didn’t really stick with me. After I’d read Legends and gotten to know Viv better as a character, I appreciated it more on my second read. It’s essentially the story of how she becomes domesticated, as she spends the summer in a town called Murk after being injured during a battle against the skeletal minions of the necromancer Varine. She comes to love reading, and works as an assistant to the bookstore owner, a rattkin named Fern. She has a romance with a dwarf baker, although it doesn’t last; and also befriends the gnome Gallina, who joins her mercenary band. As in Legends, the business grows and modernizes over time, including having its first author signing. And I’ve always been interested in what books are like within fictional worlds. It also employs a gryphet called Potroast that’s part pug and part owl, and a skeletal homunculus created by Varine. Another character is a tapenti, a sort of snake person.

Space Oddity, by Seanan McGuire – The follow-up to Space Opera is rather less focused than its predecessor. The Eurovision-like music contest is still a major focus, but much of it focuses on the aftermath of the previous contest, with Decibel Jones becoming depressed and listless, his saving the world having been in the past. While on tour across various planets, he makes first contact with a new civilization, and helps them to compete in the next Metagalactic Grand Prix. Valente acknowledges the influence of Douglas Adams, and this book has much the same style as the Hitchhiker’s Guide in several respects, like its constant digressions and satire of institutions. There are a lot of weird aliens, including time traveling red pandas, but space society is still a parody of our own, writ large. I liked the part where, once Earth makes contact with aliens, humans either don’t really care or become creepily obsessed with them. The inhabitants of other planets are also disturbed by how much the people of Earth desire to cuddle things. And there are some quite clever names and song references.