My fifth book for the Speculative Fiction Challenge is Tortall and Other Lands by Tamora Pierce. This is a collection of short stories, most of which had been previously published but a few were new. Thankfully I had only read two of the stories before so most of the anthology was new to me.
Tamora Pierce is one of my favorite authors so it is no surprise that I really enjoyed this collection of stories. My favorite was The Dragon’s Tale which has characters from The Immortals quartet. This story is told from Kitten the dragon’s perspective and it was so nice to revisit these old friends.
There wasn’t a story I didn’t like, but I really hope she writes more about Adria and Lost, Tonya and Lindri, and Arimu and Sunflower!
To see what other people are reading for the challenge go to
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I need to pick this up!
It’s a nice collection as long as you haven’t already read most of the stories. Though I guess if you want to be able to reread them it’s nice to have all in one book.
I can’t wait until October when the new Beka Cooper book comes out!
I reviewed this book earlier this month too!
The one short story I absolutely hated was Huntress at the end – I really, really hated how at the end there was this deus ex machina and just . . . it’s so contrary to everything else Tamora Pierce writes! She’s usually all about the main characters finding their own way and solving their own problems and in that one, that was nothing but a vindictive fantasy about killing bullies. I can’t decide which part I hated more – having an ineffective main character who didn’t solve her own problems or the killing of bullies part.
My favourite was definitely Lost though. LOVED IT. 😀
I didn’t hate Huntress but it definitely wasn’t one of my favorites. It was one I had already read so I just skimmed it this time. I agree that the god stepping in instead of the heroine solving her own problem wasn’t like most of Pierce’s stories. Well, she has gods step in all the time but usually only to advise or annoy the heroine, not to completely solve the problem. And as a anti-gang/bully story I don’t think it gives very good advise— killing your enemies probably isn’t the message today’s teens need.
I want to read more about Lost and Adria, I think a book about them would be great!