Kelson Reviews Stuffhttps://hyperborea.org/reviews//images/reading-600.jpg2024-03-12T04:05:47Zhttps://hyperborea.org/reviews/Kelson Vibberkelson@pobox.comhttps://kvibber.comTaishi Hainan ChickenKelson Vibberkelson@pobox.comhttps://kvibber.com★★★★★ - Variations on chicken and rice, all of them good.2024-03-12T04:05:47Zhttps://hyperborea.org/reviews/business/taishi/
<p><abbr class="p-rating" value="5" title="5 stars out of 5" aria-label="5 stars out of 5.">★★★★★</abbr></p>
<p>Finally got around to trying this place, and it’s <em>definitely</em> going on the list for repeat take-out! Mostly they have variations on chicken and rice plates, so you may want to plan on eating all vegetables the next day to make up for the carbs and meat, but the chicken, rice, and sauces are all <em>really</em> good.</p>
<footer>This post by <a class="p-author h-card" rel="author" href="https://kvibber.com">Kelson Vibber</a> originally appeared <a class="u-url" href="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/business/taishi/">on Kelson Reviews Stuff</a></footer>A City on MarsKelson Vibberkelson@pobox.comhttps://kvibber.com★★★★★ - Kelly and Zach Weinersmith: Accessible and intricately researched, with scattered humor to keep the reader's interest. Getting to space is the easy part. Staying there is going to be a lot more complicated.2024-02-24T05:20:24Zhttps://hyperborea.org/reviews/books/city-on-mars/<p>Kelly and Zach Weinersmith</p>
<p><abbr class="p-rating" value="5" title="5 stars out of 5" aria-label="5 stars out of 5.">★★★★★</abbr></p>
<p>Accessible and intricately researched, with scattered humor to keep the reader’s interest.</p>
<p><em>Getting</em> to space is the easy part. <em>Staying</em> there is going to be a lot more complicated than anyone wants to believe. There are plenty of established tropes in science-fiction and among serious space enthusiasts, but a lot of them have major gaps in them when you start pressing for details. What happens to a fetus in microgravity? Can you scrape together enough soil nutrients to supply agriculture for a whole Mars city, or do you need to constantly import fertilizer from Earth? How do you make sure you have enough medical supplies on-hand?</p>
<p>The authors wanted to write about what we know about space settlement. But it turns out it’s a really good primer for what we <em>don’t</em> know and need to research before we can get serious.</p>
<p>It’s also an interesting companion to <a href="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/books/under-alien-skies/"><em>Under Alien Skies</em></a>, which takes the approach of “assuming we’re able to work out the details, this is what it would be like there.” And, well, we have a lot more details to work out.</p>
<footer>This post by <a class="p-author h-card" rel="author" href="https://kvibber.com">Kelson Vibber</a> originally appeared <a class="u-url" href="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/books/city-on-mars/">on Kelson Reviews Stuff</a></footer>Onyx BOOX Poke3Kelson Vibberkelson@pobox.comhttps://kvibber.com★★★★☆ - I've been using the Poke3 as my main ebook reader for a couple of years now, mainly because it's a convenient size, has a clear e-ink display, and can run the Android app for any eBook store.2024-02-09T05:31:47Zhttps://hyperborea.org/reviews/products/onyx-boox/
<p><abbr class="p-rating" value="4" title="4 stars out of 5" aria-label="4 stars out of 5.">★★★★☆</abbr></p>
<p>I’ve been using the Poke3 as my main ebook reader for a couple of years now. It’s the same 6-7-inch form factor as the Kindle Paperwhite or the Kobo Clara, which makes it easy to carry around whether you’re reading on the go, in bed, or anywhere in between. It’s an e-ink display, which means its battery lasts longer and you can read it easily in bright sunlight. The display is sharp enough to minimize eyestrain.</p>
<p>What makes it different is that it’s not a single-purpose device. <strong>It’s an Android tablet.</strong> That means I’m not limited to the built-in software for reading side-loaded DRM-free books. I can hook it up to Google Play or F-Droid and install other ebook apps like KOReader or Librera…and the Kindle, Kobo, Nook, and <a href="http://ebooks.com/">eBooks.com</a> readers and read books from <strong>any eBook store</strong>. (It occurs to me I’ve never used the Onyx store/cloud connectivity.) I’ve <a href="https://hyperborea.org/journal/2013/04/ebook-stores/">built up extensive libraries</a> on Kindle and Kobo over the past decade-plus, along with books direct from publishers, in Humble Bundles, from public domain sources and so on. It’s nice to be able to find them all on one device. And of course it’s not limited to just ebooks: RSS readers, Pocket, viewing websites or Gemini capsules, email, you name it!</p>
<p><a href="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/images/boox-poke3.jpg"><picture><source type="image/avif" srcset="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/img/boox-poke3-150w.avif 150w, https://hyperborea.org/reviews/img/boox-poke3-200w.avif 200w, https://hyperborea.org/reviews/img/boox-poke3-300w.avif 300w, https://hyperborea.org/reviews/img/boox-poke3-600w.avif 600w" sizes="100vw" /><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/img/boox-poke3-150w.webp 150w, https://hyperborea.org/reviews/img/boox-poke3-200w.webp 200w, https://hyperborea.org/reviews/img/boox-poke3-300w.webp 300w, https://hyperborea.org/reviews/img/boox-poke3-600w.webp 600w" sizes="100vw" /><source type="image/jpeg" srcset="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/img/boox-poke3-150w.jpeg 150w, https://hyperborea.org/reviews/img/boox-poke3-200w.jpeg 200w, https://hyperborea.org/reviews/img/boox-poke3-300w.jpeg 300w, https://hyperborea.org/reviews/img/boox-poke3-600w.jpeg 600w" sizes="100vw" /><img alt="A slightly-bigger-than-hand sized flat black device with a light gray display showing a grid of application icons including Kindle, Kobo, KOReader, eBook Reader and more. A toolbar at the bottom of the display includes Library and Store along with Apps, Storage and Settings." decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="center" src="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/img/boox-poke3-150w.jpeg" width="600" height="450" /></picture></a></p>
<p>The built-in e-reader app, Neo Reader, is optimized well, and a lot more responsive than anything else except KOReader (which is also designed for e-ink displays), so I end up using one of those when possible. The built-in Chromium-based web browser, Neo Reader, works well enough.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Kindle, Kobo, Libby, Nook and <a href="http://ebooks.com/">eBooks.com</a> reader apps</strong> all work, with display tweaks. (Nook’s video splash screen looks terrible, but book pages are fine.)</li>
<li><strong>Hoopla</strong> works, though you have to enable background activity in the system’s Optimize dialog to download books. (The Android app setting for background battery use doesn’t do anything when you try to change it directly.)</li>
<li><strong>Lagrange</strong> works really well for Gemini capsules.</li>
<li><strong>Firefox</strong> and <strong>Vivaldi</strong> both work, but are slower than Neo Browser.</li>
</ul>
<p>Battery life is surprisingly good, especially with it set to freeze apps when they’re not in the foreground, and auto-shutdown after a period of inactivity. (The downside is that it doesn’t put you right back where you left off if it’s powered down all the way.) And it charges and syncs via USB-C, which means I don’t have to go hunting for a micro-USB cable!</p>
<h2>Display</h2>
<p>The pre-installed apps are all well-optimized for e-ink displays. The resolution is high enough to minimize eyestrain. And there’s a frontlight with adjustable brightness and color temperature, which is nice!</p>
<p>Now, e-ink displays update slowly to begin with. But the touchscreen responsiveness on the Poke3 is <strong>way too slow</strong> for anything highly interactive. The on-screen keyboard can be <em>painfully</em> slow. Even tapping on an app icon or flipping through pages can be hit-or-miss sometimes.</p>
<p>The bigger problem is that <strong>most Android apps aren’t designed for e-ink</strong>. They’re designed for full-color displays where gradients look good and you can choose off-white or off-black for your background to reduce eyestrain…when what works best on this kind of display is mostly solid black and white, with the occasional grayscale for photos. The <strong>built-in apps <em>are</em> designed with this in mind</strong>. There is a tool for tuning the refresh rate, contrast, fonts and so forth per-app, which helps a lot, but there’s only so much it can do with an app or website that’s designed with dark gray on light gray or colors that contrast each other just fine, but work out to nearly the same shade of gray.</p>
<aside><p>(The system doesn’t tell web browsers that the display is <a href="https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/@media/monochrome">monochrome</a>, or set for <a href="https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/@media/prefers-contrast">more contrast</a>, so websites can’t adjust to a more appropriate color scheme.)</p>
</aside>
<p>I wouldn’t use it for games, and I don’t do much web browsing on it. My son managed to get YouTube running once, mostly to see what it would look like on the display, but of course the refresh rate was abysmal! But for reading, the display issues are minimal, and the versatility outweighs it.</p>
<h2>Newer Models</h2>
<p>The Poke3 is old. At this time, BOOX is selling the <a href="https://shop.boox.com/products/poke5">Poke5</a>, but the specs on the website aren’t detailed enough to tell how much they’ve improved the touch response and app performance. And now they have a more expensive reader in this size, aptly named the <a href="https://shop.boox.com/products/page">Page</a> which <strong>adds back physical page-flipping buttons</strong>. If third-party apps can use the buttons, that would bypass the worst of the responsiveness issues!</p>
<h3>Updates</h3>
<aside><p>February 20: Added note on how to get Hoopla to download books you’ve borrowed.<br />
February 28: Installed Nook to make sure it works on here. I never bothered before because I only had one Nook book and I’d already read it.</p>
</aside>
<footer>This post by <a class="p-author h-card" rel="author" href="https://kvibber.com">Kelson Vibber</a> originally appeared <a class="u-url" href="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/products/onyx-boox/">on Kelson Reviews Stuff</a></footer>CSCPay MobileKelson Vibberkelson@pobox.comhttps://kvibber.com★★★☆☆ - Now my laundry doesn't just depend on the washer and dryer, but on a controller box, its internet connection, my internet connection, my phone charge, and an online service.2024-02-02T16:41:20Zhttps://hyperborea.org/reviews/apps/cscpay/
<p><abbr class="p-rating" value="3" title="3 stars out of 5" aria-label="3 stars out of 5.">★★★☆☆</abbr></p>
<p>Is it better than stopping by the bank every other week for more rolls of quarters? Maaaaaybe. It was during the <a href="https://hyperborea.org/journal/2020/08/no-quarters/">2020 covid-lockdown coin shortage</a>, but now?</p>
<p>It means doing my laundry depends not just on the washer and dryer working, but on the control box working, the control box’s internet connection working, my phone being charged, my phone’s internet connection working, and the CSC online servers working.</p>
<p>I can’t remember the last time the washer or dryer broke down. But there’ve been plenty of times when the app couldn’t find them, or couldn’t find my account.</p>
<p>On the plus side, it <em>is</em> nice to be able to check whether a machine is available before going to the laundry room. And <em>sometimes</em> it alerts me when a cycle is done. (It’s supposed to always, but it doesn’t.)</p>
<p>But that’s a lot of extra points of failure for not much improvement.</p>
<footer>This post by <a class="p-author h-card" rel="author" href="https://kvibber.com">Kelson Vibber</a> originally appeared <a class="u-url" href="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/apps/cscpay/">on Kelson Reviews Stuff</a></footer>Microsoft Outlook (Android)Kelson Vibberkelson@pobox.comhttps://kvibber.com★★★★☆ - It works. More stable than the desktop version. Handles mail, calendar and contacts, offers the focused/other inbox view. Tries to keep you in Microsoft's apps. OK for work, wouldn't use it for personal mail.2024-02-02T16:31:19Zhttps://hyperborea.org/reviews/apps/outlook/
<p><abbr class="p-rating" value="4" title="4 stars out of 5" aria-label="4 stars out of 5.">★★★★☆</abbr></p>
<p>It works. More stable than the desktop version. Handles mail, calendar and contacts, offers the focused/other inbox view.</p>
<p>Outlook tries to keep you using Microsoft’s apps as much as possible. It tries to get you to install Edge for opening links. It keeps its calendar and contacts to itself instead of sharing with the system. And of course it wants you to add your other email accounts and use Outlook for them instead of something else.</p>
<p>On the other hand, if you’re using Outlook to access your work email on your otherwise personal phone, that’s actually kind of convenient for keeping them separate.</p>
<footer>This post by <a class="p-author h-card" rel="author" href="https://kvibber.com">Kelson Vibber</a> originally appeared <a class="u-url" href="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/apps/outlook/">on Kelson Reviews Stuff</a></footer>Kéan CoffeeKelson Vibberkelson@pobox.comhttps://kvibber.com★★★★★ - Great indie coffeehouse. Good coffee, good place to hang out. Established by the founder of Diedrich Coffee, a local chain back in the 80s and 90s.2024-02-01T03:33:13Zhttps://hyperborea.org/reviews/business/kean/
<p><abbr class="p-rating" value="5" title="5 stars out of 5" aria-label="5 stars out of 5.">★★★★★</abbr></p>
<p>I’m still amused that this place is still going strong 15 years after Starbucks closed an “underperforming” location.</p>
<p>Back in the day, this was an early location of Diedrich Coffee, a small local chain that grew to a regional chain. It was always busy. Great coffee, and a great place to hang out.</p>
<p>Fast forward a couple of decades: Martin Diedrich stepped back from the company to run a single indie coffee house (the original Kéan) instead of corporate management, and corporate sold the chain to Starbucks. Once this location was converted, it wasn’t worth going to. It was just another Starbucks. And <a href="https://hyperborea.org/journal/2008/07/star-ucks/">I <em>never</em> saw it full</a>. <em>Never</em>. It closed after only a couple of years.</p>
<p>And then Diedrich picked up the empty storefront and made it a second location for Kéan Coffee…and not only is it <strong>really good</strong>, it’s <strong>worth hanging out at again</strong>…and it’s been busy every time I’ve been there since then. And they still roast their own coffee. Whenever I’m in the area, I try to hit either Kéan or Lost Bean. Even if I’m coffee’d out for the day, I’ll grab a bag of coffee beans to take home.</p>
<p>I recommend the Mayan Mocha and the Turkish Latte.</p>
<footer>This post by <a class="p-author h-card" rel="author" href="https://kvibber.com">Kelson Vibber</a> originally appeared <a class="u-url" href="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/business/kean/">on Kelson Reviews Stuff</a></footer>Gmail (Android App)Kelson Vibberkelson@pobox.comhttps://kvibber.com★★★☆☆ - Works well with multiple accounts and display modes, but tracks you more than it should.2024-01-31T15:47:07Zhttps://hyperborea.org/reviews/apps/gmail/
<p><abbr class="p-rating" value="3" title="3 stars out of 5" aria-label="3 stars out of 5.">★★★☆☆</abbr></p>
<p>Works well with multiple accounts. Easy to set up with Gmail or with any IMAP-based email provider. Handles both light and dark mode, and is good at detecting when a message was designed for a larger screen and adjusting the layout so you can read it.</p>
<p>But it tracks you more than it should. In particular, any outgoing links are modified to route through Google’s servers first. And I have no idea what else it might be doing with info it gets from my other email accounts – never mind what they do with the actual Gmail account!</p>
<p>Between that, and just generally trying to <a href="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/tag/degoogling/">reduce my dependence on Google</a>, I’ve <a href="https://hyperborea.org/tech-tips/android-default-email/">switched</a> to using <a href="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/apps/k-9/">K-9</a> with a third-party email account.</p>
<footer>This post by <a class="p-author h-card" rel="author" href="https://kvibber.com">Kelson Vibber</a> originally appeared <a class="u-url" href="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/apps/gmail/">on Kelson Reviews Stuff</a></footer>Fossify Apps: Replacing Simple Mobile ToolsKelson Vibberkelson@pobox.comhttps://kvibber.com★★★☆☆ - Simple Mobile Tools was purchased and now does everything it used to refuse to. Fossify is a privacy-respecting fork.2024-01-30T02:12:44Zhttps://hyperborea.org/reviews/apps/fossify-replace-smt/
<p><abbr class="p-rating" value="3" title="3 stars out of 5" aria-label="3 stars out of 5.">★★★☆☆</abbr></p>
<p>The “Simple Mobile Tools” suite <em>used to be</em> a great source of basic apps that didn’t slurp up your data, clog up your apps with advertising, or charge exorbitant prices. They aren’t anymore.</p>
<p>At the end of 2023, the suite was <a href="https://tgrush.bearblog.dev/simple-mobile-tools-falls-victim-to-zipoapps/">sold to ZipoApps</a>, a company known for acquiring existing apps and bloating them with all of those things. (Their <a href="https://www.trustpilot.com/review/zipoapps.com">TrustPilot reviews</a> are an interesting mix of 5-stars from devs who sold them their apps, and 1-stars from customers complaining about unauthorized charges.)</p>
<p>Fortunately, the apps were GPL-licensed.</p>
<h2>Forked!</h2>
<p><a href="https://github.com/FossifyOrg">Fossify</a> forked the entire suite, cleaning up anything that’s not compatible license-wise, re-branding the original privacy-focused apps and picking up development.</p>
<p>The forked apps started making their way into F-Droid a week or two ago. The calendar, file manager and gallery were the first.</p>
<p>That was a relief. Back when I started moving my calendars from Google to Nextcloud, I settled on Simple Calendar. That went out the window when I read about the sale. I used Google Calendar for a few weeks – it least I <em>knew</em> what they were collecting – and installed <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.fossify.calendar">Fossify Calendar</a> as soon as I could do so without side-loading it.</p>
<h2>Not Simple Anymore</h2>
<p>In the meantime, ZipoApps has indeed started destroying the apps they bought, judging by the reviews. The top one for <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.simplemobiletools.calendar">Simple Calendar</a> today:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>It originally said there would be a one-time payment of 2.99 after the free trial. I thought I’d gladly pay that so I continued to use it. When the trial was up I was given the option to buy not for the single payment of 2.99 but for <strong>$15/week!</strong> The app itself is exactly what I want over other calendars I’ve tried. And I would pay for adless, but over $2/day is insane. Banner ads would be tolerable but it has video ads when opening the app and adding an event. Wish I’d read the reviews.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>(Emphasis added.) Before the sale, Simple Mobile Calendar did in fact have a single one-time payment option of a couple of dollars. $2.99 at the most.</p>
<p>The company replied:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Sorry to hear that the price for the Premium subscription seems high to you. Please, note that the App on the Premium version opens up many exciting features and opportunities for you and it is definitely worth the price. The Premium version has no ads. Thank you!</p>
</blockquote>
<p>“Seems” high"? $15/week for a simple calendar is exorbitant.</p>
<p>Video advertisements on a basic tool are insane.</p>
<p>And who knows how much data they’re sucking up from your device and probably selling?</p>
<p>I hate this sort of business that purchases something only to strip it for parts and sell off the broken pieces at inflated prices. Destroying things for short-term gain only works until you run out of stuff to destroy and have to start over again. Building something? That’s got long-term potential.</p>
<p>It’s especially galling since <strong>the whole purpose of Simple Mobile Tools was to <em>not do this</em>.</strong></p>
<h2>Fossify Roll-Out</h2>
<p>The Fossify apps are <a href="https://search.f-droid.org/?q=fossify">continuing to roll out on F-Droid</a>, with Contacts, Phone (dialer) and SMS Messenger now available as well.</p>
<p>And the first two, Calendar and File Manager, <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/dev?id=7297838378654322558">have made it to the Play Store</a>, though they’re technically still “early access” for now. I’ve switched over the two apps from F-Droid to bringup the download count and helo with <a href="https://github.com/orgs/FossifyOrg/discussions/57#discussioncomment-8145586">open testing</a>.</p>
<footer>This post by <a class="p-author h-card" rel="author" href="https://kvibber.com">Kelson Vibber</a> originally appeared <a class="u-url" href="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/apps/fossify-replace-smt/">on Kelson Reviews Stuff</a></footer>GearyKelson Vibberkelson@pobox.comhttps://kvibber.com★★★★☆ - Really lightweight but still modern, so it's a good choice on lower-end hardware. Basic IMAP features, good for most day-to-day email use.2024-01-30T01:23:05Zhttps://hyperborea.org/reviews/software/geary/
<p><abbr class="p-rating" value="4" title="4 stars out of 5" aria-label="4 stars out of 5.">★★★★☆</abbr></p>
<p>Geary is really lightweight but still feels modern, so it’s a good email client for lower-end hardware. IMAP features are basic, but 90% of what most people will need, most of the time. Plain text email, formatted email, moving messages around, multiple accounts, etc. Comparable to <a href="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/software/apple-mail/">Apple Mail</a> on a Mac, but for Linux.</p>
<p>It’s <em>just</em> email, and assumes you have another application for contacts and calendars. (Think of it in terms of the classic Unix philosophy of using multiple tools, each of which does <em>one</em> thing <em>well</em>.)</p>
<p>Unfortunately there’s still that <a href="https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/geary/-/issues/432">remaining 10%</a> for which you’ll probably need your mail provider’s web interface or something more complete <a href="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/software/thunderbird/">like Thunderbird</a>, but Geary is plenty for most day-to-day use.</p>
<h2>GNOME-ish</h2>
<p>Geary is built to run on a GNOME desktop, but it can run just fine on others <a href="https://wiki.gnome.org/Apps/Geary/FAQ#Not_running_GNOME_3.3F">as long as the services it needs</a> are available. (Folks for contacts, a keyring for passwords, and gnome-online-accounts for some email providers) And if you want to manage your contacts, you’ll need another application for that. I’ve got Geary and GNOME Contacts running quite happily on LXQt without any other GNOME applications.</p>
<p>Though I did have to <a href="https://hyperborea.org/tech-tips/geary-gmail-off-gnome/">temporarily install GNOME</a> to configure Gmail access.</p>
<footer>This post by <a class="p-author h-card" rel="author" href="https://kvibber.com">Kelson Vibber</a> originally appeared <a class="u-url" href="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/software/geary/">on Kelson Reviews Stuff</a></footer>IlluminationsKelson Vibberkelson@pobox.comhttps://kvibber.com★★★★★ - T. Kingfisher: Madcap magical damage control in a family of eccentric artist-magicians. Fun like A Wizard's Guide to Defensive baking, but with a tighter story and better-defined characters.2024-01-25T05:06:15Zhttps://hyperborea.org/reviews/books/illuminations/<p>T. Kingfisher</p>
<p><abbr class="p-rating" value="5" title="5 stars out of 5" aria-label="5 stars out of 5.">★★★★★</abbr></p>
<p>Similar to <a href="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/books/wizards-guide-to-defensive-baking/"><em>A Wizard’s Guide to Defensive Baking</em></a>, but a tighter story, with better-defined secondary characters and internal story logic.</p>
<p>Again there’s a young apprentice with small, oddly specific magical abilities, who gets drawn into a caper, blamed for it, and finds herself as the only person who can resolve it, and has to both stretch her magic and convince the adults around to help her (and let her help them).</p>
<p>This time the magic is art. Paintings and drawings, if done the right way with the right details by by someone with the right ability, can become magical objects. Rosa was born into a family of Illuminators. A very <em>eccentric</em> family. Each with their own eccentricity. And that’s <em>before</em> she encounters the magical talking crow (who is <em>very</em> taken with shiny objects) and the malicious creature he was guarding.</p>
<p>The stakes are more personal: the Scarling has it <em>specifically</em> out for the Mandolini family. But there’s a clear potential for it to spiral out of control. Like Mona, Rosa makes mistakes, but again they’re <em>believable</em> mistakes. And in this book the adults have <em>character</em> reasons for finally believing her, not just plot reasons.</p>
<p>There’s a lot of mischief and magic, though only one mandrake as I recall. And because Rosa doesn’t need to leave home on her hero’s journey like Oliver (<a href="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/books/minor-mage/"><em>Minor Mage</em></a>) or Mona, everyone in her family takes part in the story instead of just being window dressing for the framing sequence.</p>
<p>It’s aimed at kids, yes: kids who appreciate not being talked down to. And it’s written so that adults will have fun with it too.</p>
<p>More of <a href="https://www.redwombatstudio.com/books-for-kids/">T. Kingfisher’s kids’ books</a> at her official website.</p>
<footer>This post by <a class="p-author h-card" rel="author" href="https://kvibber.com">Kelson Vibber</a> originally appeared <a class="u-url" href="https://hyperborea.org/reviews/books/illuminations/">on Kelson Reviews Stuff</a></footer>