Robert McCammon did something similar in Stinger. Read that one instead.
I spent much of December reading Mike Carey’s Felix Castor series, which I very much enjoyed. Well-rounded, and he obviously had a clear plan for it (Jim Butcher, take note!) that he followed and managed, largely, to pull of. The last kindle book concluded with the first bits of the first chapter of Kate Griffin’s Matthew Swift series, which I’ve now started. I’m so-so about it right now, but maybe it’ll grow on me.
Spent yesterday finishing Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House. Great story, creepy and poignant. Currently, I’ve on my kindle The Tudors: The Story of England’s Most Notorious Dynasty by G. J. Meyer. It’s certainly worth the price of admission, seeking to establish that the fabled Tudors were, by and large, a thoroughly revulsive bunch. Meyer spares some positives for young Henry VIII and an occasional nod to Elizabeth when she does something individually nice, but generally were a dispicable set of self-centered tyrants. It certainly is corrective, even if I presume that not everything in the 100 years of Tudor rule was a self-serving disaster…
Happy New Year! While upcountry for the holiday – it was pretty darned chilly in the mountains, but now it’s back to 90-degree-plus temperatures in Bangkok – I finished Chasing the Dime, by Michael Connelly. Very good. A standalone, not part of his Harry Bosch or Lincoln Lawyer series. However, he always includes a little overlap, and a couple of characters from the Harry Bosch series made appearances. In this one, a scientist moves into a new apartment in Santa Monica and immediately starts getting telephone calls from men looking for a girl named Lilly. It seems he was assigned her number that she used to have on her Web page where she advertised her escort services. He becomes intrigued as to what happened to her, and she seems to be missing …
Next up: Back to Connelly’s Harry Bosch series with The Narrows. It’s a sequel to The Poet, which featured FBI Special Agent Rachel Walling. This one has both Bosch and Walling.
In preparation of Arisia, I’ve just re-read The Outer Limits Companion, which gives the history of the original 1960s TV series and recounts every episode. I’m also reading John Carter and the Gods of Hollywood, a suprisingly in-depth (and rapidly assembled) book on the whole marketing fiasco surrounding that movie.
I’m also reading The House of Seven Gables when out, and a book I received as a gift listing Christmas crimes. On the to-be-read shelf I’ve got a 1960 popular book on chemistry, and Ursula K. Leguin’s Always Coming Home (with the included set of recordings), something I’ve wanted to read for a long time. Also Underground City, a gift from many years ago that I never got around to.
I finished “Watership Down” last night. I definitely liked it much more than I expected. I think I’ll start Jon Krakauer’s “Under the Banner of Heaven” next.
Okay, so Under the Dome is scrapped. I’m going to check out Hellboy and Stinger.
Under the Banner of Heaven is pretty good, IMO - although, if I’m completely honest, I do think it was a bit slow at some parts. Could just be me though - the information it has in it is not to be missed though. Definitely worth a read.
I just finished Thornton Wilder’s The Bridge of San Luis Rey, and just started The Hollow Man by John Dickson Carr.
Got* Hydrogen Sonata* by Banks and Dodger by Pratchett for Christmas. Devoured the former - it was great. Slower going through through the latter, it’s not really grabbing me, but not completely putting me off either.
Am also re-reading Boyett’s The Gnole, which is as lovely a mix of whimsy and dark fantasy as one could wish for.
I’m glad to hear that!
I finally remembered to catch up with this thread! 
So to ring in the new year I am reading “Guns, Germs and Steel” by Jared Diamond. It was reccommended to me on Straight Dope AGES ago and I’ve benn ummm distracted by shiny mysteries with endless sequels. 
I’m currently reading The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins. Because it has clearly inspired dozens of mystery novels since it was first published, it really has a timeless feel to it, like it could have been written 40 years ago instead of 140 years ago.
Looks interesting. I’ve put it in my queue.
Really? I read it a few years ago, and I wouldn’t say it’s a spectacular book, but I’d recommend it to anyone who finds the topic interesting. A decent, if not great, book.
I just read this a couple of months ago. It is good, but I think it’s overlong, and I was disappointed with the solution after the magnificent buildup.
That and his Into Thin Air make for very compelling non-fiction.
I am reading *Matriarch: Queen Mary and the House of Windsor *by Anne Edwards. Amusing mental junk food I picked up for a quarter at the local library. I just finished *Shadow of the Titanic: The Extrodinary Stories of Those Who Survived *by Andrew Wilson. Very sad material. So many of those who survived lived in penury afterwards or haunted by imagery of the deaths of close relatives and friends they had witnessed. My only complaint is that he’s far too easy on J. Bruce Ismay, who was a White Star Line owner, designer of the ship, passenger on the liner and a man who vetoed the use of more lifeboats. Ismay deserved every single allegation against him. He lived a life of enormous wealth afterwards when he should have been forced to beg in the streets for his cowardice and incompetence.
I read Into Thin Air last year and loved it. I would definitely recommend it to anyone.
Finished the Lincoln book, finally. As it turns out, nearly the entire second half of the book consists of cites and attributions, so it’s not nearly as exhausting a read as I had feared.
I’m now reading The Happiness Trap, by Russ Harris, a book about the self-treatment of depression through Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, since my son suffers from it. I can see that the ideas have merit, but the author’s incessant use of quotation marks makes me crazy. Can you “see” what I mean?
Politzania, were you aware that in Wreck, Flynn intentionally created one character for each of the 16 Myers-Briggs personality types, and chose to immediately kill off the character most suited to bringing together the motley crew? I see this book as a masterful psychological study, in the way he moved between the various points of view and interpretations of events, staying true to, while fleshing out, each of their types. Forgive me for repeating this, as I’ve mentioned this before here, but I asked Flynn which Myers-Briggs type he was, to be so gifted at perceiving and representing the nature of each type. He answered that he gets different results whenever he takes the test, and so imagines a cube with 16 points, in which he inhabits the point in the center of the cube.
Also the town in Lust Lizard is supposed to be Moore’s take on Cambria, California, a small, artsy tourist town near Hearst Castle. This book was my introduction to Moore, and I adored it.
I’m currently reading Hounded, the first in the Iron Druid Chronicles, by Kevin Hearne. Lots of Celtic history and mythology, and a fun, breezy read.
Aw man…! What a bummer. Hopefully I’ll still enjoy it.
I don’t mind (over)long books; I have an hour on the subway in the morning and an hour in the evening I need to kill, so I have plenty of time to read.
This is on my shelf, waiting for me to finish my current book. I’m really looking forward to it.
I just finished Watership Down, too. It took a good 150 pages before I was really into it - it was a bit hard to identify with rabbits, at first - but it turned out to be really good. I’m going to try to get my son to read it.
I read Silas Marner, which I liked pretty well. It was an unexpectedly short, pleasant read. I was familiar with the basic plot because I like the 1994 Steve Martin movie, A Simple Twist of Fate, which is a modern adaptation of the novel. It’s about bitterly disappointed man who becomes a lonely miser, but then he’s drawn out of his miserable life by caring for an orphaned little girl.
I tried the first book in another mystery series set in Roman Britain: The Germanicus Mosaic, by Rosemary Rowe. It wasn’t bad, but it was not as good as other similar historical mysteries by Lindsey Davis, Ruth Downie or Steven Saylor. The author seemed less interested in telling a story than with giving the reader lessons on ancient Roman mores.