1. Old Man's War - John Scalzi.
A re-read. Scalzi is one of my favorite SF writers and Old Man's War one of my favorite books.
2. The Ghost Brigades - Scalzi.
Yet another re-read. I was a bit meh on it the first time through, but I enjoyed it more on the second read.
3. Night Train to Rigel - Timothy Zahn.
The first Zahn book I've ever read to completion, I've had Night Train to Rigel for a long time and made several attempts in the past to read it. 2017 was the year, though, and I wish I had read it sooner. I'm going to try and read the rest of the series this year.
4. The Last Colony - John Scalzi.
Unlike the other two, this was not a re-read. I really liked how the book ended because I did not expect it at all. Going to try and read the last two books this year.
What surprised me about this is that it isn't fantasy. You would think it would be, what with the dragons and medieval-ish setting, but it's SF and I'm not one to dispute it. Dragonflight was better than I thought it would be, but not all that great. I didn't regret the time spent reading it, but I won't likely revisit the book again.
6. Phule's Company - Robert Asprin.
All I can say about this book is that I wish I had read it and the rest of the series sooner and I wish the books weren't out of print. It didn't knock my socks off, but I hated to see it end.
Recurring theme for this post: My infinite regrets for not reading some of these books sooner and Trading in Danger is yet another one. I'm definitely inclined towards reading books written by women and books featuring women as the protagonists, so the Vatta's War series overall has hit both those buttons for me.
8. Shards of Honor - Lois McMaster Bujold.
Basically, I became a huge Vorkosigan and Bujold fanboy last year and provided that I can get my hands on The Vor Game (shoutout to my local library for removing their copy from circulation...), that will continue this year.
See Trading in Danger.
10. Barrayar - Lois McMaster Bujold (Part of Cordella's Honor omnibus).
See Shards of Honor.
Ditto.
12. The Mountains of Mourning - Bujold (Part of The Borders of Infinity. It's a novella but I'm counting it anyways).
Ditto.
13. Spinneret - Timothy Zahn.
Honestly? I read this book in large part because the cover reminded me of one of those 4X strategy games, like Master of Orion II. Not a bad book, but certainly not Zahn's best. I will say this though: His non-Star Wars stuff is worth reading.
It was pretty nice to visit an era in the Honorverse where the Star Kingdom wasn't yet a powerhouse. Franchises with lots of books tend to decline is quality, so I was pleasantly surprised that A Call to Duty was so enjoyable.
Highly readable, weird, and excellent. One of the best books I read last year.
I did go on a bit of a SF reading spree with nine books in a row. That was a surprising accomplishment for me because at best, I might only read two books of the same genre in a row. Rarely three.
It might also be the last time before I'm changing things up for 2018. The goal the past two years was just to see how many books I could read and I'm more than happy with the results there, but I don't want to follow up this year. Instead, I'm aiming for quality rather than quantity, so the total number will likely drop. On the flip side, I might finally start reading bigger and thicker SF tomes. Not doorstoppers, mind you, but books that I've put off reading because I didn't want to get tied up reading the same book for an entire month. I'm also aiming to "broaden" my horizons by reading non-SF&F works, so that will probably eat into it.
So anyways, do any of these books look interesting? Read any of them before?
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