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That bookstore owner in Portland sold me a fantasy novel with zero battles
I picked up 'The Goblin Emperor' expecting sword fights and got a book about court paperwork and manners, but somehow it ended up being the most compelling read I've had in two years - has anyone else found a book that completely flipped what they thought they liked?
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ryanprice1mo ago
Oh man, YES. I had that exact same thing happen with 'The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet' by Becky Chambers. I grabbed it off a shelf thinking it was gonna be some space opera with laser fights and alien wars, but it's basically just a crew of weirdos living on a spaceship and dealing with each other's feelings and cultural differences. There's this whole subplot about an alien species that communicates through color changes on their skin and the human translator has to learn to read their emotions, and I was completely hooked. I sat there reading about interspecies bureaucracy and felt more invested than I do in most action-heavy books. It's like sometimes the quiet character stuff hits way harder than explosions ever could.
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robin8361mo ago
Wait, so you're telling me I could read about space HR problems and color-changing lizard people instead of another hero saving the galaxy? Where has this been all my life?
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