Goodreads half and quarter stars

Earlier this week, Goodreads announced that readers will now be able to give half-star and quarter-star ratings. I applaud them for listening to their users and offering a feature that many people have asked for. 

Personally, I don't think the new rating system will affect how I rate books. I like having only five options (and in reality, I only use 3-, 4-, and 5-star ratings). It's easy enough for me to decide whether a book is a 5-star read vs. a 4-star read, or whether it's a 4-star read or a 3-star read. It'll be more difficult to decide between 4 and 4.5 stars or between 4.5 and 5 stars. I can't imagine trying to decide between quarter stars. What makes a book 4.5 stars vs. 4.75 stars? I'd rather keep things simple and round to the nearest whole number. :-)

It will be interesting to see how many people take advantage of the new rating capabilities. What will this do to the average ratings for books? Will people who would previously have given a 5-star rating to a book now give it 4.5 or 4.75 stars instead?

Do you plan to use half and quarter stars on Goodreads? 

When a favorite author misses for me

When an author has published a lot of books, it's natural that some are better than others. However, it still surprises me when I read a book from one of my favorite authors that ends up being disappointing. I ran into this recently with a book from one of my top five favorite authors. Until that book, I rated almost everything I read from the author as five stars, with the occasional four-star read that was good but not great by their lofty standards. I gave the new book three stars. If the author's name wasn't on the cover, I wouldn't have known they were involved.

At first, I felt guilty for not liking the book, as if disliking one book was a betrayal of everything else I've loved from that author. I even tried to find aspects of the book that I enjoyed as I struggled through it. 

The experience reminded me of a few points to keep in mind as a reader:

• Separate the book from the author - One miss doesn't negate a backlist I already love. It's OK to say a specific book didn't work for me without it affecting my opinion of the author as a whole.
• No book is universally loved - Most books are not objectively good or bad. Plenty of other readers may love a book I dislike and vice versa. 
• The bar is higher because the author is a favorite - Ironically, being a big fan can make me a harsher critic. I've read enough of this author's works to expect a higher bar than I would from other authors, so it's more noticeable when a book doesn't meet those high standards.
• It doesn't have to sour the next book - Recognizing that I didn't enjoy one book from the author doesn't mean writing off whatever they publish next. In fact, I plan to devour their next book.

One thing I'd also add is to go in with tempered expectations when a favorite author collaborates with someone else because the book that disappointed me was co-written by my favorite author and another writer I'm unfamiliar with. The blend of two people's voices won't produce the same result as a solo work, and I should have expected that from the start.

Has this happened to you with one of your favorite authors? How did you deal with it when a book from someone you love missed the mark for you?

Books about authors

I recently read The Ending Writes Itself by Evelyn Clarke and thoroughly enjoyed it. Much of the appeal was because the story's main characters were authors, and I realized how much I enjoy reading books that feature authors as protagonists.

I went through my Goodreads history to find my favorite books from the last ten years where a main character was a writer. Here are my top five, sorted by author's last name:

• Book Lovers - Emily Henry
• The Magpie Murders - Anthony Horowitz
• The Plot - Jean Hanff Korelitz
• Yellowface - R.F. Kuang
• The Woman in Cabin 10 - Ruth Ware

Having finished reading The Ending Writes Itself, I would now include it among my top five. 

Noticeably absent from the list is perhaps the most famous book featuring an author as a protagonist, Stephen King's Misery. It's not excluded because it was published more than ten years ago but because I haven't read Misery yet. Now that I'm aware of how much I like books where a main characters is an author, I'm going to add Misery to my TBR list.

Are there any books with author protagonists that you recommend?

Update on 2026 reading goal

Last year, I made it a point to make more progress in reading book series. It went so well that I repeated the goal this year. 

The series books I've read so far this year (in the order I read them) were:

• Three Shattered Souls - Mai Corland
• A Discovery of Witches - Deborah Harkness
• Carl's Doomsday Scenario - Matt Dinnaman
• Outlander - Diana Gabaldon
• A Storm of Swords - George R.R. Martin
• Shadow of Night - Deborah Harkness
• Ship of Magic - Robin Hobb
• Jade City - Fonda Lee
• Lord of Chaos - Robert Jordan
• The Book of Life - Deborah Harkness
• Jade War - Fonda Lee

I did a good job following the plan I laid out in February. :-) 

Of the eleven books, I rated six of them 5 stars, two were 4 stars, and I gave 3 stars to the remaining three. The 4.27 average is far above my overall average rating for the books I read, so this reading goal is another success so far in 2026. I'm excited to continue with this plan and look forward to the other series books I'll read the rest of the year.

Recent books that were surprisingly good (or not so good)

As someone who reads about 100 books on average in a year, it's natural that I'll come across ones that were better than I thought they would be and ones that were worse.

Here are three books I recently read that I enjoyed more than I expected to:

• Jade City by Fonda Lee - The Green Bone Sage has been on my TBR for years, but I've avoided reading it because I'm not a fan of stories about mob families. In the case of Jade City, I was wrong. Although there are violent elements in the book, it was much more engaging than I expected. It's one of the best books, if not the best one, that I've read this year!
• Play Nice by Rachel Harrison - I read the occasional horror story, and they are hit or miss. I didn't expect much going into Play Nice, but it ended up being one of my favorite haunted house books.
• Camino Island by John Grisham - I'm a fan of John Grisham's legal thrillers but not so much his books in other genres, so I didn't have high expectations for Camino Island. This book turned out to be more interesting than I thought it would be, and it helped that the plot involved a book. :-)

On the other hand, these books didn't live up to my expectations:

• Onyx Storm by Rebecca Yarros - I bought into the hype when Fourth Wing came out, and I liked the first book in the Empyrean series. However, my opinion of each successive book has declined, and I'm not sure if I will continue with this series.
• Ship of Magic by Robin Hobb - The fact that I didn't like Ship of Magic was a big surprise. I liked the Farseer Trilogy well enough, and fans of Robin Hobb have mentioned that the Liveship Traders series is her best. I just couldn't get into the story and didn't feel invested in the characters. I will likely read the second book to see if the series improves though.

Finding a book that is surprisingly good makes me happy, and it happens more often than reading a book that is not as good as I expected. (Or maybe I remember the good ones more than the not-so-good?) Have you read any books lately that are better or worse than you expected?

Where to start with my books

When I discover an author who already has an extensive bibliography, I often search for suggestions about which of their books to start with. With that in mind, I thought it'd be fun to share where I think a new reader should start with my books. 

The good news is that most of my books are standalone, so you can pick them up without having read my other books. However, there are four books I normally recommend to my first-time readers, depending on what you're looking for.

1. If you want something short in order to sample my writing style: "Drive". "Drive" is a short story set in a post-apocalyptic world, a theme that runs through several of my books. Although it's the first book in a series of short stories, "Drive" can be read on its own.  
2. If you want a longer story that's representative of the YA books I've written: Transmissions. I recommend this book especially if you aren't in the mood for a dystopian/post-apocalyptic story. It's YA, it's a novella, and it's a great story IMHO.
3. If you like reading a series: Hopeless. The only adult novel series I've written is the After Z-Day series, and Hopeless is the first book. Read it to find out my take on the zombie apocalypse.
4. If you're looking for a book for a younger audience: George and the Galactic Games. This is the first book I published, so it holds a special place in my heart. Although it's targeted to a pre-teen audience, readers of all ages can enjoy this book.

I hope this helps if you've been considering which of my books to start with!

     

AI-generated books

In my last post, I mentioned AI-generated books as a trend I don't support. Then came the controversy surrounding Shy Girl, a novel that Hachette pulled due to allegations that the author used AI when writing the book. 

There's no doubt that AI is creating more of the content that we consume, whether they are books, images, or videos. I heard stories of self-published AI-written books entering the market two years ago. It's also getting harder to distinguish what was created by a machine rather than a person. 

What's troubling to me isn't just that AI is taking over our lives. (And in case they're monitoring me, I, for one, welcome our AI overlords!) It's the deception on the part of authors who use AI. To me, stories reflect the way a writer views the world and how they have experienced it. Like art, books are an expression of us as human beings. People read books not just to ingest facts or prose, but to feel a connection to the story and characters on the page. Learning that a story I read was written by AI would feel like finding out that a person I've met recently and have been connecting with is actually a machine. I would be devastated if one of my favorite authors ever used AI to write their books, even if AI could imitate their writing style perfectly.

I'm afraid that we'll see more controversies like Shy Girl, especially as AI improves on a seemingly daily basis. I can only hope that authors choose not to use it to write their stories, or, if they do, they disclose the role that machines have in their works so that readers aren't misled.

Book trends I've embraced and ones I haven't

The types of books we read and the way we learn about books and consume them have changed in the past decade. I've jumped on board some book trends, while others haven't been for me. 

Here is how I've responded to various recent book trends.

• Deluxe/Collector editions - I've fully embraced deluxe and collector's editions. Most physical books that I buy nowadays are deluxe editions with sprayed/stenciled edges or collector editions that feature special features such as author signatures or leather binding. The only "regular" editions I buy now are used books or surplus/wholesale books that are discounted. 
• Audiobooks - Sadly, I haven't been able to get into audiobooks. Listening to someone read a book just feels different to me than reading it myself. The narrator makes a difference, but even the best narrators I've listened to don't provide the same feeling as when I read the book on my own.
• BookTok/Bookstagram - I love the rise in bookish social media. This has become my predominant method of discovering books. I also find it soothing to scroll through pictures of books and bookshelves. Some people can stare at art for hours. I can stare at books.
• Romantasy - I've discovered that romantasy isn't for me. Even the most praised romantasy books haven't made much of an impression on me. I haven't quite figured out yet if it's the predictable romantasy tropes and plots or something else.
• Cozy fantasy - On the other hand, cozy fantasy has worked for me. I'm a fan of fantasy already, and cozy fantasy is like the comfort food subset of fantasy. I haven't read as much cozy fantasy as I'd like, but I'm open to trying more.
• AI-generated content - It's scary how well AI can write, and I've probably read AI-generated content without knowing it. However, as a general principle, I'm against books written by AI. Books are like art IMHO, and I feel that both art and stories should be created by humans as they are an expression of us, not just products to be churned out by a machine. I'll get off my soapbox now.
• Book bans - A hard NO on book bans. No one should control what someone else is able to read. I'll get off my soapbox for the second time.

What are some recent book trends that you've embraced or not embraced?

2026 reading goal

Last year, I made it a point to do better in finishing or making progress on reading a series. As my end of year post showed, my average rating for the series books that I read in 2025 was 4.125, higher than the 4.05 average for all books I read last year. Due to the success of last year's goal, I'm going to continue following up on various series on my TBR. 

So far, the series I've identified for 2026 are:

• The Broken Blades by Mai Corland - I read the first two books in this series last year and gave them both 5 stars. I look forward to wrapping up the series this year.
• All Souls by Deborah Harkness - I watched the Discovery of Witches TV series last year and liked it a lot. My goal is to read the first 3 books in this series, which covers the scope of the TV show.
• Outlander by Diana Gabaldon - I started watching the TV series in late 2025. I'm still on season 1, and now I want to read the books it's based on. Given the number of books, I won't be finishing the series this year. Reading at least the first 2 in 2026 is my goal.
• The Green Bone Saga by Fonda Lee - The Green Bone Saga has been on my TBR list for ages.  I considered adding it to my series-reading goal last year but ran out of time. This will be the year I finally read this series.
• Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinnaman - The first book in this series was a lot of fun. This is also a long series with new books still coming out. My plan is to read at least 2 more books this year.
• The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan - I will continue to make progress in this 14-book series. Reading 2 more this year is my goal.

I may add more series books to my 2026 goal as the year progresses, but the above list is a good start that will keep me occupied for a few months. I'm curious if I will enjoy this year's series as much as I enjoyed the ones I read last year. Stay tuned.

Favorite reads of 2025

When it comes to ranking my favorite reads, 2025 was the year of Asian authors for me. Five books by three Asian authors made my top ten list. (Cixin Liu and R.F. Kuang each had two books on the list.) Another book by an Asian author (Five Broken Blades by Mai Corland) barely missed the cut. And this doesn't include R.F. Kuang's Katabasis and SenLinYu's Alchemised, both of which I plan to read in 2026. Don't be surprised to see more books by Asian authors on my list of favorite 2026 reads!

Here are my top 10 favorite books read in 2025:

1. Sunrise on the Reaping - Suzanne Collins 

The Hunger Games series is my favorite YA series of all time, and the first book in the series is one of my all-time favorite books, regardless of genre. Sunrise on the Reaping comes close to recapturing the magic of that first book. What I felt from reading the latest installment in the series took me back to how I felt when I read the first Hunger Games book. I didn't want the book to end, and I yearned for more when I finished reading it. All of the accolades heaped upon this book are well-deserved, and I recommend it to everyone, even if you haven't read the other books in the Hunger Games series.

2. Atmosphere - Taylor Jenkins Reid 

Taylor Jenkins Reid does it again! Atmosphere is exactly what I expected and worthy of all the hype it received. This book gets bonus points for taking us inside the life of astronauts in training and Joan's explanation of the stars, since I was once obsessed with astronomy and the space program too. Once I started reading this book, I didn't want to put it down, and the ending was the most emotionally intense last pages of any book I've read in recent memory. I don't want to give away anything though. You have to read it for yourself, and you definitely should.

3. The Poppy War - R.F. Kuang 

The Poppy War has been on my TBR list for ages, and I'm so glad I finally read it. Based on Chinese history, in particular the Sino-Japanese War, the novel wrapped me up in its world and characters. It started as an outcast-at-school type of story, which I generally like (e.g., Harry Potter), but the second half quickly moved to a different phase of the protagonist's life. The action never slowed; it only gained momentum until the end. I appreciated the way the characters grew. For example, Rin reached a truce with her greatest rival at school, which is not something I've seen in other stories. I may not have agreed with all of Rin's actions, but she was portrayed realistically as a complex and human protagonist. This book gave me Grace of Kings vibes (possibly because both books were written by Chinese authors and based on Chinese history), which is a high compliment, given how much I love the Dandelion Dynasty series.

4. Wind and Truth - Brandon Sanderson 

What a satisfying conclusion to the first arc of the Stormlight Archive. Before reading Wind and Truth, I wondered how Brandon Sanderson would balance resolving major plot lines from the first four books while leaving enough open for the second arc. I needn't have worried. Sanderson is a genius. And he wrote a 1,300-page book that didn't bore me at all. In fact, I found myself more excited and engaged as the story went on. The only downside to finishing Wind and Truth is that I will need to wait years for Book 6.

5. The Dark Forest - Cixin Liu 

I read the Remembrance of Earth's Past series this year (a.k.a., The Three Body Problem series). Even if it wasn't my goal in 2025 to finish more series books, I'd probably have read all of the books anyway because The Dark Forest and Death's End were so good. This series has some of the most imaginative science fiction concepts I've ever read. Cixin Liu makes bold predictions about the future that are both plausible yet fantastic. In addition, the story, spanning centuries, chugs along at a good pace that kept me interested throughout.

6. Death's End - Cixin Liu 

I found the second and third books in the Remembrance of Earth's Past series to be equally good, so their places in this ranking can easily be reversed. Like The Dark Forest, the gripping story in Death's End spans centuries, and the science fiction was imaginative. Looking back on the series, as impressed as I am with the creative science, I'm also impressed with Cixin Liu's understanding of human behavior and how we are likely to act in times of crisis. I recommend this series to all science fiction fans.

7. My Salty Mary - Brodi Ashton, Cynthia Hand, Jodi Meadows 

Every book by the Lady Janies (Lady Marys?) has been great, and My Salty Mary was no exception. I love the brand of humor that is a hallmark of the Lady Janies books, and this one had me laughing out loud while I was reading it. I breezed through this book quickly and when it ended, I wished that it hadn't. If you haven't read any of the Jane and/or Mary books, I highly recommend them. I can't wait until the next one!

8. When the Moon Hits Your Eye - John Scalzi 

The moon has turned into cheese. Once I got past the absurd premise, I was hooked by this book. I thoroughly enjoyed reading about the ways that such a phenomenon could affect different people. Some of the stories were funny, some were touching, and some made me contemplate the current state of our non-cheese-moon world. The result is a highly entertaining book that I'd want to read again.

9. The Burning God - R.F. Kuang 

After reading this last book in the Poppy War series, I was sad that I reached the end. I wanted it to continue. In fact, the reason why this book wasn't ranked higher is because I felt like R.F. Kuang left me hanging with more left in the story. Maybe it's because I like my stories to have a happy and tidy ending. Aside from the final pages, the rest of the book was great, and I highly recommend the Poppy War series.

10. Blood Over Bright Haven - M.L. Wang 

I started hearing buzz about this book in late 2024, with some people saying it was the best book they read all year. I can see why. The themes of sexism, racism, and privilege really resonated with me, and even if they hadn't, the writing and world building and characterization would have been enough to win me over. It's been a while since I've read a novel where such flawed characters still elicited strong sympathy in me, a testament to M.L. Wang's writing skills. The main reason I didn't rank this book higher was the ending, and I won't say more for fear of spoiling it.

What I read in 2025

It's that time of the year to look back on the books I read in 2025. Once again, I set a goal to read at least 100 books, and I managed to read 104, 2 more than the 102 books I read in 2024.

The average rating for the books I read this year was 4.05 stars, a percentage point higher than the 4.04 average from 2024's books read. The breakdown by star rating was:

• 5 stars - 32 books
• 4 stars - 45 books
• 3 stars - 27 books

A 2025 goal I set for myself was to do a better job in reading a series. These series books turned out to be more enjoyable than the average book I read. There were 16 books that I targeted in order to finish a series (e.g., Remembrance of Earth's Past, Farseer Trilogy) or to make more progress in a series (e.g., The Wheel of Time). My average rating for the 16 series books ended up being 4.125. Given how well that went, it's likely that I will continue this goal in 2026.

In my next post, I'll list my top ten reads of 2025. Stay tuned!

The importance of sympathetic characters

I was recently reading two fantasy books at the same time (I often read more than one book at a time), and I found that I really liked one of them and didn't care for the other. Both were well-written IMHO with interesting plots. The difference was that I was sympathetic to the protagonist of the book I enjoyed and rooted for her throughout, while I couldn't care less about the fate of the protagonist in the book I disliked.

There were two traits that caused me to fail to connect with the main character in the second book:

1. She was not a good person - every character has flaws, but I'm more likely to care about a character if they are a basically decent person. Being good is not a requirement for me though, since I rooted for Kaz's crew in Six of Crows and for Kelsier in Mistborn, for example.
2. She nade dumb choices - whenever there were multiple possible courses of action, the protagonist seemed to always choose the one that put her or those she cared about in danger. I lost count of the number of times I asked "Why???" when I was reading the book. After a while, I was no longer invested in a happy ending for her because she was actively sabotaging her fate through bad choices for the sake of advancing the plot.

If not for the way the protagonist was portrayed in the book I didn't like, it could have been as good as the book that I did enjoy reading. The experience reminded me of how important sympathetic characters are to the overall quality of a story. The character doesn't have to be a saint, but they have to possess qualities that will pull readers to their side and root for them. 

You may have the most engaging plot and beautiful writing, but if the reader doesn't care about your protagonist, then it doesn't matter. A great character can overcome a mediocre plot, but I can't think of an example where I thought highly of a book when I didn't care about the main character. 

Have you read stories where you weren't sympathetic to the protagonist? What was it about them that made you not care? How did it affect your enjoyment of the story?

Introducing my non-fiction book, Your First Investing Playbook

I mentioned in my last post that I was working on a new non-fiction book. Well, it's completed and published! Introducing... Your First Investing Playbook: A Beginner's Investment Roadmap.

What led me to write this book was wanting my kids to be financially prepared when they enter adulthood. Unfortunately, financial literacy isn't something that was taught to most of us in school, and we either learned it through trial and error or didn't learn it at all. I experienced the former path, so I wanted to pass along what I learned to my kids and to all beginning investors out there.

The book is short, only about 60 pages, but it covers the essentials, allowing readers to take the next steps on their own based on their interests. 

You may have noticed that the author name on the book cover isn't H.S. Stone. I chose a different pen name for this book to avoid confusing readers who may wonder why an author of speculative fiction also wrote a book about personal finance. I definitely didn't want anyone to think that Your First Investing Playbook was fictional. 

I enjoyed the experience of writing this book and being able to write for pleasure again. I don't know if I'll write any more non-fiction books in the future, but this first book was definitely fun. I hope you'll find it educational yet entertaining.

 

Writing a new book

It's been ages, but I'm writing a new book again! Instead of writing another speculative fiction story though, this time, I'm writing a non-fiction book. 

The main reason that I chose non-fiction is that I found my schedule is more suitable for writing non-fiction than fiction. Although I've been doing more research for this book than I have for any of my fiction books, it's also been easier for me to dive into writing when I have just a few minutes to spare. This has been a problem for me in writing another novel because I need time to get into the proper state of mind when writing fiction, remembering where I left off and what is supposed to come next, and I haven't been able to find chunks of free time to reach that zone for more than a year. 

With this non-fiction book, I can pick up any section that I want to and add to it. If my day job continues to leave me with little time for writing, perhaps non-fiction is the new direction my writing will take. For the time being, it sure feels good to write what I want to again!

Hopeless (After Z-Day Book 1) is free this weekend

Today and tomorrow, Hopeless, the first book in my After Z-Day series, will be FREE on Amazon! Go on and give it a try, especially if you're a fan of zombie apocalypses. If you like it, consider picking up Relentless and Soulless too. You can get the entire series for less than $7 this weekend!

 

 

Books I liked more than other readers

In May, I listed some highly rated fantasy books that I didn't like as much as other readers did. In this post, I'll do the opposite: list books I liked more than other readers did, but I won't confine the list to the fantasy genre. To determine the list, I sorted my Goodreads read list by rating and chose the books with the lowest ratings that I gave 5 stars to.

In alphabetical order by title, here are the eight lowest-rated books that I liked more than other readers:

1. All This & More by Peng Shepherd (3.34 Goodreads rating) - I don't know if the low rating was due to the book's Choose Your Own Adventure format. Although the format was a positive feature for me, I also thought the story was good even if it was told using a regular narrative structure.
2. Armada by Ernest Cline (3.56 Goodreads rating) - Were people expecting the same magic as Ready Player One (which has a 4.23 Goodreads rating)? Although I didn't think Armada was as good as Ready Player One, I still liked it a lot.
3. Hairpin Bridge by Taylor Adams (3.49 Goodreads rating) - You may know Taylor Adams from his more popular and more highly rated book, No Exit (3.99 Goodreads rating). I actually liked Hairpin Bridge more than No Exit.
4. Landline by Rainbow Rowell (3.54 Goodreads rating) - It's a travesty that a Rainbow Rowell book could have such a low rating! I don't know what other readers were thinking, but Landline is a great book! Enough said.
5. My Calamity Jane by Brodi Ashton, Cythia Hand, Jodi Meadows (3.57 Goodreads rating) - Another travesty. OK, My Calamity Jane may be a tad less awesome than the other Lady Janies books, but they're all great IMHO.
6. Nine Perfect Strangers by Liane Moriarty (3.56 Goodreads rating) - Yes, I liked the book as well as the TV series. I'd recommend Nine Perfect Strangers for anyone who wants to start reading Liane Moriarty.
7. Once Upon a Beanstalk by Kate Avery Ellison (3.50 Goodreads rating) - I read this over ten years ago when I was very much into fairy tale retellings. If that's what you're in the mood for, Once Upon a Beanstalk is as good an option as other more popular mashups.
8. A Short Walk Through a Wide World by Douglas Westerbeke (3.52 Goodreads rating) - This book was marketed as The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue meets Life of Pi. Maybe it's because the former is one of my favorite books of all time that I liked A Short Walk Through a Wide World so much.

If you've thought of reading one of these books and hesitated due to the Goodreads rating, I suggest you reconsider because you may end up liking it as much as I did!

 

Update on my 2025 reading goal

At the beginning of the year, I set a reading goal to finish reading more series, or at least make more progress through them than I usually do. This is because I'm notoriously slow in making my way through a series, even the ones I like. 

I've been reading at least one book in a series each month. The books I read so far were:

• Royal Assassin - Robin Hobb
• Fatal Revenant - Stephen R Donaldson 
• The Poppy War - R.F. Kuang
• The Dark Forest - Cixin Liu 
• The Valiant - Lesley Livingston 
• Death's End - Cixin Liu 
• The Defiant - Lesley Livingston
• The Shadow Rising - Robert Jordan 

Three of the books listed (The Poppy War, The Valiant, and The Defiant) were not part of series that I had already started but rather series that I've been meaning to read.  I've heard so many good things about The Poppy War series that I was going to start it this year anyway, but now I'm vowing to complete it, especially since I enjoyed the first book so much. The Valiant is a lesser known series that I've been planning to read for years, and this year was as good a time as any. I'm glad I did because I've liked the first two books.

Of the 8 series books I've read so far, four earned 5 star ratings, three were 4 stars, and I gave one 3 stars. That's a pretty impressive average rating of 4.375. Maybe I should be finishing series more quickly than I have been doing.

 

Highly rated fantasy books that I didn't like as much

No book will appeal to every reader. That is true no matter what the book is or how well-written it is. On this blog, I've documented my reading history with well-regarded books, including my positive experience with Goodreads Choice Awards finalists in 2021 and my less positive experience with NY Times bestsellers in 2020. I thought it'd be interesting to look back on which books from my read shelf have the highest Goodreads ratings that I didn't like. In this post, I'll focus on fantasy books since that is my favorite genre (closely followed by sci-fi and thrillers). I may list books from other genres in future posts.

In alphabetical order by title, here the top eight highly rated fantasy books that I didn't like as much:

1. A Clash of Kings (4.42 Goodreads rating) - Ten years ago (!), I talked about how my dislike of the Game of Thrones books was the reason why I was late to watching the TV show. I didn't read past A Clash of Kings because it was so painful to finish, but I finished the TV series.
2. A Day of Fallen Night (4.34 Goodreads rating) -  I thought The Priory of the Orange Tree was good but too long. A Day of Fallen Night wasn't as good and still too long. Maybe I would've liked it if it was under 400 pages rather than over 800.
3. The Fifth Season (4.30 Goodreads rating) - I thought The Fifth Season was boring until the twist at the end. It boggles my mind how this book won so many awards. Needless to say, I didn't continue reading the series.
4. A Game of Thrones (4.45 Goodreads rating) - See A Clash of Kings above. A Game of Thrones wasn't as awful as A Clash of Kings, but I still didn't like it.
5. House of Earth and Blood (4.46 Goodreads rating) - Before Sarah J. Maas fans berate me, let me say that I really enjoyed her Throne of Glass series. It turns out that I don't like her romantasy books as much, or romantasy in general. 
6. Iron Flame (4.37 Goodreads rating) - This is another case of my not liking romantasy very much. I thought Fourth Wing was fine, mainly because the novelty of the dragons and the training outweighed the romance aspect. That didn't happen with Iron Flame.
7. The Lies of Locke Lamora (4.31 Goodreads rating) - I'm still confused why I didn't like this book. It had all the elements of a story I should like, but the story wasn't quite interesting enough, the characters not quite likeable enough, and the writing not quite good enough, so the end result was a book that was just meh.
8. The Stand (4.35 Goodreads rating) - This applies to just about every Stephen King book because I've yet to come across one I really liked. The Stand happens to be the highest rated of the ones I've read.

 

Auto-buy authors

I've seen several social media posts lately where readers share their auto-buy authors. These are authors whose books a reader would automatically buy just because they were written by the authors. 

I went through all of the books I rated on Goodreads to come up with my auto-buy authors. I was surprised that there are only three:

• Brandon Sanderson - For anyone who has been following me, this is a no-brainer. Not only will I buy any book he publishes, I will fund any crowdsourcing campaign he starts. :-) 
• Lisa Gardner - By now, I own and have read almost all of the books written by my favorite thriller author. She has a new book coming out in 2025. I don't know anything about it other than the title, but I'm buying it! 
• Laini Taylor - Unlike Brandon Sanderson and Lisa Gardner, Laini Taylor hasn't published as many books. Based on how much I loved the Daughter of Smoke & Bone series and the Strange the Dreamer duology, however, I'd buy whatever she publishes next.
  

Although the three authors above are my only "official" auto-buy authors, there are several others who nearly met the bar (in no particular order):

• Lee Child - I would auto-buy any book in the Jack Reacher series. The reason Lee Child the author isn't an auto-buy for me is that he has published books that don't feature Jack Reacher, and those books are not auto-buys.
• Suzanne Collins - The books in the Hunger Games series are auto-buys. (I would've bought Sunrise on the Reaping regardless of what reviewers said.) I enjoyed her Underland Chronicles as well, but I wouldn't classify them as auto-buys.
• Rainbow Rowell - Rainbow Rowell is 90% an auto-buy author for me. Before I read the first two Simon Snow books, she would've been an auto-buy, but I lost interest in that series and haven't read the third book yet.
• Ken Liu - I've only read his Dandelion Dynasty series and The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories. Based on those five books, Ken Liu could be an auto-buy, but the sample size is too small for me to say for sure.
• Taylor Jenkins Reid - This is another example where my sample size is too small. I've thoroughly enjoyed the five books I've read, but I'm not certain she is an auto-buy author. Nevertheless, I plan to buy Atmosphere when it's released.
  

 As an author, I can only aspire to be on some reader's auto-buy list. Who are your auto-buy authors?

 

Does fiction writing help with business writing?

 

I've been so busy with my day job for the past year that I haven't had time to work on my next novel. But that doesn't mean I'm not writing. I churn out thousands of words a day, whether it's business documents, emails, or chat messages with coworkers. Do I think my experience in writing fiction have helped with the writing I do at work? Absolutely!

Whether you're writing a story or a business memo, the ability to communicate is vital. Just as a story won't be as enjoyable if the author can't express what is happening to the characters, work goes more smoothly if coworkers can communicate their ideas to one another. As someone who works in software engineering, we often need to share engineering design ideas and be able to understand designs proposed by other engineers. I have seen miscommunication result in building the wrong software or building it incorrectly. While I can't claim that my ideas are all good, I can tell that I get them across in a less confusing manner than many of my colleagues, and I attribute that to the years I've spent writing stories.

Three ways that writing fiction have helped me in my business writing:

1. The mechanics of writing, such as spelling, syntax, and grammar - Even in this age of spell check, I come across too much business writing riddled with misspellings and sentences that don't make sense. It's hard to get your ideas across if people can't understand your sentences.
   
2. Saying what you want to convey - It doesn't matter how smart you are if your email or memo doesn't convey what you intend or if your engineering design document doesn't describe how you think the software should be implemented. Thanks to my fiction writing, with its need to tell my stories without confusing readers, I believe I have a good grasp of this.
3. Not saying more than what you want to convey - Just as importantly as getting your point across is not drowning your message in extra words. While some fiction authors have a problem with this, my stories tend to be more concise, and this has helped with my business writing.

I miss writing fiction because of the workload from my day job, but I'm glad that my fiction writing background serves me well at work too. Once I finally get to return to writing stories again, it'll be interesting to see if all of the practice in business writing helps with writing fiction.