I just finished The Botany of Desire: A Plant’s-eye View of the World. It’s not the most rigorously researched or reasoned book around, but it does tell some fascinating stories about the history of apple trees and other plants and how they’ve evolved to exploit humans, just as flowers evolved to exploit bees.
Before that, I read Skin Folk by Nalo Hopkinson, a book of Caribbean-Canadian magical realist short stories. Very good.
And the book I read before that, recommended by Hopkinson (“Off the hook!”) and picked up solely because of the name, was The Coyote Kings of the Space-Age Bachelor Pad. Best I can describe it is like an Afrocentric Tim Powers novel: tremendously fun, hilariously written, and just a great all-round read. I loved it.
I just got this as a Christmas present; I didn’t really look at it, so I’ve no idea what it’s about, but now I’m looking forward to reading it, if people here like it. That’ll be next week, assuming I’ll get a few days off work…
I’ve finally gotten around to reading 'Tis, by Frank McCourt, and have started Bushwhacked, by Molly Ivins. The latter may be a mistake, as it’s just pissing me off all over again about how apathetic American voters are.
Yeah, I’m sticking with the Anita Blake series, but I’m not paying money for any more Merry Gentry books.
I just finished Rachel Caine’s Weather Warden series. I really liked the first book, and the rest are not bad, but I don’t much like the direction she took them. It may be a dumb thing to complain about in a paranormal series, but there’s too much magic. Everyone is getting too powerful and the huge, abstract magical battles get dull after a while. Also every book ends in a cliffhanger, which wasn’t a problem when I had all five books lined up but now that I have to wait months for the next one, it’s annoying.
Next I’ll finish Kelley Armstrong’s Otherworld series. I still have George R. R. Martin’s **A Feast for Crows **to read after Christmas, and I’m also a couple of stories into his Tuf Voyaging collection.
I borrowed a sack full of Tony Hillerman’s mysteries from my mom, and I’m looking forward to reading those.
I did that too, Dung Beetle, and when the library gets the audiobook, I’ll probably listen to it, too.
Some books just beg to be listened to. I read Lisey’s Story and liked it, with reservations. When the audio finally came in for me, I started to listen to it, only because I had nothing else to listen to. It’s much better read aloud. It already has the quality of someone telling you a story and the annoying parts [the cutesy inside words like “smuck” and “SOWISA”] don’t jar as much. It helps that it’s read by Mare Winningham. She does a wonderful job.
I’m reading the second book in the Depford series, The Manticore by Robertson Davies. Where has this guy been all my life. He’s great!
Currently I’m reading Mysteries of Pitsburgh by Michael Chabon. I’m also reading lots of Harper’s and New Republic articles, plus the New Yorker.
Mysteries is pretty good. I’ve got a heap of other books to move on to after I’m done with it, and I’ll probably get more for Christmas this year. And I’ve been getting a hankering to finally read Gravity’s Rainbow lately, but there’s no telling if I will. It certainly won’t be for lack of any other reading materials!
I just finished Adventures in Unhistory by the late Avram Davidson. This collection of interlinked essays on arcane topics was previously released in a limited edition; used copies occasionally became available at slightly less than $1,000. If you’ve read Davidson & enjoyed his unique style, you might enjoy this discursive & erudite collection. In fact, you might be thrilled to finally have this well-produced volume in your mitts. And then you’ll devour it greedily; or more slowly, as this is rich stuff.
Re-reading S M Stirling’s *The Peshawar Lancers * on the commute. Quite the ripping yarn.
I promise to resume working through The Pile of Substantial Literature after Christmas! (If I don’t just send away to the UK for the last volume in the amazing Bold As Love series.)
Finally found a copy of A Catskill Eagle (it’s the Spenser book where he gets back with Susan) - and my husband got me a bunch of others as well. Just finished that one, and started from the beginning of his series with The Godwulf Manuscript. I’m about halfway through that one.
I just finished Elizabeth Peters’s Tomb of the Golden Bird, Robin Hobb’s Royal Assassin, Barbara Hambly’s Circle of the Moon, and Caroline Stevermer’s College of Magics.
Currently reading Clinton McKinzie’s Badwater, Jennifer Colt’s The Butcher of Beverly Hills, and the Dave Barry/Ridley Pearson novel Peter and the Starcatchers.
I’m also in the home stretch with the Laura Ingalls Wilder books, which are great to read while walking on a treadmill.
I love Davidson & have visited the website. Since he died a few years ago, many of his books are back in print. I’ll definitely get another copy of Dr Eszterhazy. And another copy of the minor but amusing Clash of the Star Kings, although I’ll keep my ratty paperback with the Frazetta cover (an Aztec warrior battling a plumed serpent.)
(Time to refresh my R A Lafferty library, as well. He died in 2002; catch the books while they are in print.)
I just finished The faith club, about three women, a Christian, a Muslim, and a Jew, who walk into a bar…no wait, they start a club to discuss and understand each other. Very interesting.
I’m reading **Malory: the knight who became King Arthur’s chronicler **, which is sort of a biography, but since no one knows all that much about Malory, it has rather a lot about 15th-century life and some speculation as well.
Three cups of tea is about a mountain-climbing bum guy who decides to build a school in a remote Pakistani village, and eventually winds up with a whole organization and 53 schools, etc.
Am looking forward to borrowing Pterry’s new one Wintersmith off my sister when she’s done with it.
Just finished a decent novel titled Goodnight Texas - pretty well-written with an interesting cast of characters in a down-on-it’s luck town on the Texas coast.
Currently in the middle of The Blue Taxi, a novel set in E. Africa in the 70s - a different setting than most of what I read.
Next up, The Concord Four, a slim volume about early transcendentalists.
If you like Davidson, you’ll love