I just finished Gillian Flynn’s Sharp Objects. It’s a murder mystery told from the perspective of a 2nd rate journalist, who’s been sent to the small home town she thought she’d escaped to cover the story. It’s not something I would have picked out on my own - I read it for a book club - but it was certainly gripping. I had about 10 pages to go yesterday when I got off the Metro, so I just stood there in the station to finish it. Lots of ickiness in this book, so probably not for the squeamish.
I finished Cuckoo Song, a YA fantasy novel by Frances Hardinge. It was much better than I expected it to be, very imaginative and the author has a nice turn of phrase. I’ve added her to my list of authors to keep an eye out for in future.
Just a few pages in to Stephen King’s newest, Finders Keepers.
The Country of Ice Cream Star by Sandra Newman is definitely going to be one of the best books I read this year. The story takes place a few generations after a plague wipes out most of the US, those who survive are individuals who have a brief immunity to the disease, yet succumb by the time they reach 20 years of age … so you have an entire society made up of children and teenagers. I loved all the characters and tore through this. Two points, though – a lot of the plot is extremely brutal, and also, it’s mostly written in an invented pidgin that I found to be really easy to acclimate to, and very lyrical … but I have seen a lot of online reviews where it drove people crazy.
Oh man, that sounds good. Library hold placed!
Finished Breaking the Maya Code by Michael D. Coe.
It’s an awesome read for anyone interested in the history of science. It isn’t a guide to actually translating Mayan, but rather a history of attempts (ultimately successful - in the 1970s through 1990s) to translate the Mayan glyphs.
What makes it an outstanding read as far as I am concerned is that it isn’t dispassionate in the slightest - Mayan scholars are, or were, a most unruly lot, and he wades right in with some massive grudges to pay off. 
Rival Mayanists, Archaeologists vs. Epigraphers - all go under his guns. I have no idea how fairly, but it sure makes for entertaining reading: this is no dull outline of the topic for undergrads, but a story full of the most bizzare characters you can imagine.
To give but one example: one of the key figures in the decipherment was a Soviet artillery spotter, who finds a facimile of the Mayan codexes purely by chance in the flaming ruins of Berlin in 1945, gets fascinated - and goes on to make one the most significant breakthroughs. The account of the author corresponding with this guy during the Cold War scares of the 1950s is amusing (he speculates as to what the spooks of both sides were making of disussions of Mayan rituals and glyphs!).
Highly recommended.
Once again, playing catch-up …
Listened to the audiobook version of Prudence (The Custard Protocol #1) by Gail Carriger. Set in the same world as her Parasol Protectorate and Finishing School Victorian steampunk fantasy series, this novel follows Lady Prudence Alessandra Maccon Akeldama (Rue to her friends), a young British female metanatural – she can temporarily steal the powers of a supernatural being - vampire, werewolf etc.
Rue’s adopted father gifts her with a touring dirigible, and also assigns her to a mission to India to investigate a new sort of tea. Accompanied by her BFF Primrose Tunstell and her twin brother, the stuffy Professor Percy Tunstell along with the dashing inventor (and terrible flirt) Quesnel* Lefoux. And we can’t forget Spoo**!
Rue becomes embroiled in international espionage (not only among the British and Indians, but the local equivalent of vampires and werewolves as well); and must rely on her own pluck and sense of propriety to win the day. (Mind you, her sense of propriety doesn’t exactly coincide with that of a proper British young woman of that day and age - but that’s half the fun of this novel!) Yes, the plot falls apart if you take it too seriously, but that’s not the point of these series.
I’ll admit to being rather smitten with this universe Ms. Carriger has come up with; and IMHO her affected writing style is wonderfully appropriate for it. It’s hardly Literature and not for everyone but I find it frivolously and preposterously fun. Moira Quirk is an excellent choice for narrator as well. I do wish I’d re-read at least Timeless, the last of the Parasol Protectorate series, as it provides some background for Rue and her BFF, Primrose Tunstell, as well as their parents, despite being set almost 2 decades later.
Recommended to alternate history fans looking for something too-too Victorian - as Carriger herself puts it “Imagine Jane Austen dabbling in science and steam technology. Then imagine P.G. Wodehouse suddenly dropped vampires into the Drones Club.”
** One drawback to audiobooks - I had no idea “Conel”'s name was spelt like this!
** See above - except I couldn’t find a text reference for the plucky deckhand’s name.*
I read John Steinbeck’s The Wayward Bus over the weekend. I’d never heard of it and it was brilliant for the most part. So good that I’m going to read any Steinbeck I can lay more hands on for a while.
I finished The Reversal by Michael Connelly and I gotta say the man keeps getting better, I am so glad I read these in publication order. I also have to confess to liking Mickey a little bit more than Harry.
I think up next is Talking God by Tony Hillerman.
Two recent non-fiction reads:
How the Dog Became the Dog: From Wolves to Our Best Friends by Mark Derr. The focus was more on the pre-historic development of the “dogwolf” and “wolfdog” (Derr made a distinction that I’m still not sure I get) than the “best friend” aspect. I also wasn’t fond of the “furless biped” phrase he used to encompass the various hominids that may or may not have partnered up with the wolfdogs/dogwolves.
There’s a good bit of repetition, where Derr says the same thing in different ways, which made the book feel rather padded; I think it would have done better as an extended magazine essay in *Nature *or National Geographic. The book also flows poorly - there’s a lot of jumping back & forth in the timeline, which made it a bit of a slog at times.
That said, the material seemed fairly well-researched, from what I could tell, and was international in scope, looking at the human/dog partnership worldwide. Worth a borrow/library read if you’re into the (pre)history of dogs.
Touch: The Science of Hand, Heart, and Mind by by David J. Linden was another book that kind of missed the mark for me. It’s a little more technical/medically-oriented than I expected; the “science” part of the subtitle is the key word here. I found myself doing a lot of skimming when it came to which particular nerve endings connected to which parts of the brain - tho the diagrams were very helpful.
I thought the book was well-organized, with chapters on touch illusions, pain (both temporary and chronic), sexual touches and itching and scratching (difficult to read without getting the urge to scratch!) and enjoyed Linden’s treatment of the sociological elements of touch, presenting anecdotes along the way. (although the story (and photo!) of the woman who scratched thru her skull was a bit creepy!).
Linden is no Oliver Sacks (but then, who is?), but I might check out his other books at some point, and consider this book worth a library read if the topic interests you.
Finished The Girl With All the Gifts by M.R. Carey. Good ending good read.
Also finished 14 by Peter Clines. Labeled as a horror genre novel, but I thought it was more true sci-fi, not so much on the horror. Good story, quick read.
Thinking of reading Clines latest novel, The Fold, or something else…
I just finished The Luckiest Girl Alive. One of the many books with “girl” in the title that is being compared to Gone Girl. The two don’t really have much in common except sort of the same tone and both lead “girls” are complex, bitchy characters. I thoroughly enjoyed it and read it in about four evenings.
Currently I’m about 1/3rd of the way through The Well. It’s a narrative set against a slightly dystopian (is that proper description?) background with a hint of mysticism. It’s rather sad yet beautifully written.
I just read the Lyonesse trilogy in May, after not reading much of anything for several months. A beautiful return to reading, classic Vance. Thought it was a little slow to get moving, which was uncharacteristic, but a great tale once he spreads his wings. Unique voice, could recognise Vance in two sentences.
Just started Tree of Smoke by Denis Johnson. Johnson is blindingly good with short novels, but I’ve a sense that he can’t really be arsed with the nuts and bolts of longer books. This one’s a bit of a sprawler, apparently, so be interested to see if it keeps his attention.
I thought I was all Cromwelled out after Wolf Hall and was going to give Hilary Mantel a break for a few months, but Bring Up the Bodies came in for me at the library, so… Holy crap, that woman can write! I thought Bring up the Bodies was even better than the first book. Down and dirtier, meaner and more compelling.
Now I can’t wait for book 3, The Mirror and the Light, which is supposed to come out sometime this year.
Finished Talking God by Tony Hillerman… and find that I am more insympathy than not with Highhawk, I can’t approve of his methods. Anyway, as usual, an enjoyable read without getting to bogged down in details or over complications.
I am reading The Heir Apparent: A Life of Edward VII, The Playboy Prince by Jane Ridley. It got rave reviews and I can see why. She gives us a man who starts off as utterly unlikable and then grows up. It’s very insightful and a fascinating reading of him based on many sources including letters he wrote to his many loves. Still, he’s a selfish man who constantly cheats on his wife and lacks kindness to many of those around him. You are not exactly left liking him very much. I wanted more about his times rather than just his life.
Tony Hillerman is great. I’ve read all of his books. It was a real shame when he died. He lived in Albuquerque, where I used to live, and he was wildly popular in New Mexico. You’d step off the plane at the airport in Albuquerque to be met with a wall of his books on display for sale. You’d walk into a crowded cafe in Santa Fe and many of the patrons would be sitting there reading a Hillerman.
I just finished The Grace of Kings by Ken Liu. Overall, I liked it well enough. It’s a fantasy novel about various factions competing for political control of an island nation – so naturally there have been some reviewers making comparisons to Game of Thrones, but I wouldn’t say that is an overly apt comparison in terms of style or tone. It’s very, very loosely based on some of the hero stories and myths of a Han Dynasty.
I thought it was interesting, and admirable, that the author makes a real effort to address issues of equity for women (both in the society within the book, and in the way which the female characters are portrayed), which is often a stumbling block with this genre, although I’m not completely convinced he was successful.
Also a note that the map of the island was essentially unreadable on my kindle, and it’s the kind of book where it really helps to have a map. It’s available online at the author’s blog (which I didn’t realize until I was almost done with the book!).
Just finished Sorry About That which is nothing but a list of apologies and doesn’t offer any insights other than a generic sneer.
Just started Ghettoside about the murder epidemic of the 80s and 90s in LA. Interesting so far, but the author keeps saying “there are no innocent victims” at the same time pushing the back story of an innocent victim. And the LA detectives are a little too good to be true.
My dog-walking audiobook was The Secret Adversary by Agatha Christie, the first Tommy and Tuppence mystery. It’s a spy thriller where everything falls into the protagonists’ laps, the criminal mastermind and his henchmen are not quite as bright as a medium-priced toaster oven, and England Is Saved and everyone gets married. Meh. I am hoping By The Pricking of My Thumbs is better.
Regards,
Shodan
Anything is better than Tuppence and Tommy.
I find that By the Pricking of My Thumbs is Tommy and Tuppence. Oh well - I did another 100 pages of Ghettoside last night and it continues well. There is a fascinating scene where the lead detective breaks down the suspect into confessing by boring him to death during the interrogation. He doesn’t browbeat, he doesn’t cajole - he just talks endlessly around and around the case until the suspect is so desperate to talk about something substantive that he begins telling details of the case.
I posted earlier that the lead detectives are presented as too good to be true. That changed, slightly. The lead detective (Skaggs) is shown to be unhestitatingly willing to lie to anyone about anything, just to get them to tell him what they know. He promises to get a witness’ family into witness protection with no intention of anything of the sort. He lies to one witness about what another witness said. And, of course, he lies over and over about the evidence - non-existent witnesses, non-existent videotape, non-existent DNA. He will say pretty much anything to a witness or a suspect. I knew already that it is legal to lie to a suspect, but I didn’t realize it as more or less the default.
God help me if I am arrested. I will fall apart like cheap sneakers.
Regards,
Shodan