Finished Sold Into Egypt: Joseph’s Journey Into Human Being, by Madeleine L’Engle, which was okay.
Now I’m reading The Mountain in the Sea, by Ray Nayler.
Finished the latest Louise Penny~meh, seems like it drug on too long for the amount of story. Glad I read it but also glad I got it from the library rather than buying it.
Now started on the Hillary Clinton/Louise Penny collaboration State of Terror novel. So far slightly more momentum and deliciously interesting tidbits about the workings of the White House, the State Department and government agencies.
Started Noir, a story collection edited by David B. Coe and John Zakour.
Still reading The Mountain in the Sea by Ray Nayler, which is outstanding so far.
Started today on A History of Fear by Luke Dumas, a novel about a prisoner who claims the Devil drove him to commit his crime. Pretty good so far.
Reading a lot this month.
I picked up The Eye of Argon and the Further Adventures of Grignr the Barbarian at Arisia last weekend, hot off the press from the publisher. It includes a couple of essays, the text of The Eye of Argon with annotations, and a series of “further adventures”, mostly written in the same spelling- and grammar-challenged style as the original. It’s frequently hilarious (I loved when it compared Grignr’s battle cry to “a roaring giraffe”), although nothing can compare to the original. I like the MST3K’ed version, myself (although, sadly, it seems to have vanished from the internet)
I also picked up the L. Sprague de Camp/Lin Carter novelization of Conan the Barbarian, which I sensibly didn’t read when the film came out. De Camp and Carter have been blamed for doing awful things to Conan over the years, and this novel is arguably among the worst. I their defense, they were only adapting the screenplay by John Milius and Oliver Stone (!). There’s no way Robert E. Howard would have written a lot of what goes on here (Catherine Crook de Camp, L. Sprague’s wife, reportedly also contributed to the novel), but, on the other hand, I don’t think the de Camps and Carter would have either, were they not contractually bound to follow the script. To give the script its due, it does have a bit more of Howard’;s stuff in it than I recalled – the heroine is a combination of Valera from “Red Nails” and Belit from “Queen of the Black Coast”, it’s got Conan crucified from “A Witch Shall be Born” and climbing a tower to steal a gem from “The Tower of the Elephant”, but not enough, really, from either story. Give me a straight-up adaptation of “The Tower of the Elephant” and I’d be happy. Oliver Stone reportedly wrote his original screenplay under the influence of drugs (says Wikipedia). Well, at least I’ve finally read this adaptation, although I don’t plan on reading the other Conan movie novelizations.
I also picked up Terry Carr’s collection The Light at the End of the Universe. I knew Carr as a editor and antrhologist, but the two stories of his that I really liked – “THe Dance of the changer and the Three” and “Ozymandias” – are both in here, and I’ve wanted to read more of the samne caliber. The first is the telling of an alien creation myth and an attempt to show an alien mindset so completely alien as to be incomprehensible, much like Stanislas Lem’s novel Solaris that came out about the same time. The second is a wonderfully consistent and freaky dark story that was originally published in Harlan Ellison’s Again, Dangerous Visions, and is a really great read. Ellison, by the way, wrote the introduction to the collection.
At her request, I got my daughter a copy of Koren Shadmi’s The Twilight Man for Christmas, and she insisted I read it. It’s a graphic novel treatment of the life of Rod Serling. I’ve seen a lot of graphic novel bios of pop cultural icons lately. This one’s very good. I knew much about Serling’s life, but there was material here I hadn’t heard before. One of these days I want to see more of his stuff. “A Carol for Another Christmas” was only abailable at the Museum of the Moving Image, but has been made available on streaming service this year. I’ve never seen “Patters” or “Requiem for a Heavyweight” (or the movies made of them) or the original pilot for The Twilight Zone. The hour long episodes of The Twilight Zone were not available during syndication because they didn’t fit in the 30 minute time slots (although sometimes they bundled two together and showed them in a “movie” timeslot). I literally grew up watching these – I saw many during their original broadcasts, and have seen them countless times in reruns.
I picked up a weighty History of Photography with lots of juicy tidbits of optical history.
On audio, I listened to Preston and Child’s “Diogenes” trilogy Brimstone, Dance of Death, and Book of the Dead and the “Helen” trilogy Fever Dream, Cold Vengeance, and Two Graves, the last of which I’m listening to now. Preston and Child’s books, and especially their Pendergast novels (which these all are) are one of my guilty pleasures, especially on audio. If they don’t give you at least one over-the-top outrageous moment or concept that makes you say “Oh, come on, now!”, then they haven’t done their job.
Another author who does that is Clive Cussler (and his many collaborators). Speaking of which, I also recently read (on audio) Trojan Odyssey, the novel in which his hero Dirk Pitt gets married. Cussler himself, who often wrote himself into the books, has himself attending the wedding, using his real name.
(The reason I hadn’t read these before was that they were unavailable at my usual libraries. I’ve been traveling to others to borrow these).
I’m starting The Rook by Daniel O’Malley. I added it to my list a month or two ago based on a recommendation in this thread, and now I have no recollection of what it’s about or even what genre it is. I briefly considered looking back at the previous thread to refresh my memory, but decided it will be more fun to go in blind.
Absolutely! Since that’s basically the premise of the work 
I’m nearly finished with my reread and I had forgotten a LOT of what happened in it, so it’s almost a new read for me.
Hah! I’m through two chapters, and indeed it’s coincidental and amusing that I decided to go in blind. Must have been subconscious.
Finished The Mountain in the Sea by Ray Nayler. Brilliant. I know it’s only January, but I’ll be surprised if this isn’t the best novel I read this year. (If it isn’t, 2023 will be a very good year book-wise, as far as I’m concerned.)
Still reading Noir, edited by David B. Coe and John Zakour.
Just finished The Rook by Daniel O’Malley and wow, does it hold up for a second reading! I had misremembered things, moved events around and outright forgot a lot of the plot twists and had a deeper sense of sorrow at the letters written from Me to You.
Just this morning I download The Rose Girls by Kate Quinn. It’s a historical novel about 3 women who worked at Bletchley Park. I also ordered a used copy of Atomic Habits by James Clear in my never ending and hasn’t happened quest for being a better person.
I think the title you wanted about the women at Bletchley is The Rose Code. The Rose Girls are about three girls trying to save their family gardening business.
I started Digging for Richard III by Mike Pitts today. One of my podcasts did a two parter on Henry VII and mentioned it. So I felt it was time to pull it out of the pile and read!
You are correct BBB. The Rose Code.
I read this last year. Thoroughly enjoyed it. Quinn is a fine writer.
I only knew this because peedin’s post piqued my interest (I loved the Hidden Figures story) and I’m always looking for new book ideas. Went to my library’s catalog to see if they had Rose Girls. Did not sound like codebreaker intrigue-way too cozy for me. My library website offered Rose Code as a further search. That I put on hold.I like a little suspense and mayhem.
Finished Noir, edited by David B. Coe and John Zakour, of which the best story was “Outside the Box” by Esther Friesner.
Now I’m reading Inspired: Understanding Creativity–A Journey Through Art, Science, and the Soul, by Matt Richtel.
Finished rereading Stephen King’s Rose Madder.
The overall story was good, but there was so much vivid description of the domestic violence Norman dishes out, which I did not enjoy. I can see how it would be a rough movie adaptation.
I get the oddest notifications sometimes… Wednesday January 25, 2023 will be the 10th anniversary of our thread founder, Khadaji’s, passing. I think he would be equal parts thrilled and humbled that his thread is still barreling along. So raise a glass to him this week. Thanks Khadaji!
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