Excellent, if somewhat depressing, book.
I’m almost 200 pages into The Hero of Ages, the 3rd in the Mistborn trilogy. So far so good.
I read Kindle samples of five or six books last night and nothing grabbed me until Tell the Wolves I’m Home by Carol Rifka Brunt. It’s a year in the life of teenager June Erbus and tells of her relationship with her uncle Finn. When the book begins, Uncle Finn is painting a portrait of June and her older sister Greta. It’s 1986 and Finn is dying of AIDS.
The sample gave me four chapters and I ended up buying it. It’s only the second e-book I’ve paid money for – it’s that good.
Generally, teenagers and what they have to say don’t interest me. June is introspective and insightful, not whiny or self-involved. Her feelings are honest, not contrived. She’s interesting on her own and her relationship with her uncle and her sister makes her even more interesting.
If I had read this book as a teen, I would want to be like June. Or I’d want June to be my friend.
In addition to A Dance with Dragons, I’ve been leafing through Frustrate Their Knavish Tricks (the title is from the second verse of “God Save the Queen”) by Ben Pimlott. It’s a pretty interesting collection of essays on British politics and literature, much of it from the Eighties. Pimlott was very clearly no fan of Margaret Thatcher, and to some extent he anticipated the kind of Labour Party reforms that Tony Blair had to make in order to win, win and win again.
Just finished Me the People: One Man’s Selfless Quest to Rewrite the Constitution of the United States of America by Kevin Bleyer. I heard about this book on the Diane Rehm Show last month; the concept intrigued me, and the author (a writer on the Daily Show) came across well enough on the radio.
Bleyer is a bit more smug in print; trying too hard at times to be clever in the process of both recounting the Founding Fathers’ struggle to write the Constitution as well as his own travails in re-writing it. I have a feeling the modern-day elements/humour are not going to age well at all; but I did appreciate Bleyer’s research and in-depth descriptions of the Constitutional Convention. Bleyer put some decent effort into putting this book together and I think I’ve come away with a little better understanding of & appreciation for this document.
I probably won’t revisit Me, The People, but would more-or-less recommend it to history geeks who have already read thru all of Sarah Vowell’s books and enjoyed the Daily Show publications.
I also recently read License to Pawn: Deals, Steals, and My Life at the Gold & Silver by Rick Harrison “with Tim Keown”. I’ll admit to watching Pawn Stars, American Pickers and even the occasional episode of Storage Wars - so when I found out about this book, I thought I’d check it out from the library.
I was a little surprised at how non-fluffy this memoir was; not only does Rick talk about his early life and how his family got into the pawn business, he also shares the spotlight with Cory, Chumlee and The Old Man - they each get a chapter or two to tell their stories and are willing to talk about the bad times as well as the good. They’ve faced some hard times, both financially and personally; Cory got addicted to meth and hit bottom pretty badly before turning things around, with the help of Chumlee, of all people.
Rick also discusses the ins and outs of the business, getting almost philosophic at times. He comes across in print pretty much as he does on the show - a bit of a smart-ass, but he backs that up with actual knowledge. Yeah, you know that you’re not seeing the whole story; but that’s OK. Keown may have done the heavy lifting in putting the book together, but Rick’s “voice” seems pretty authentic and provides some interesting insights into Las Vegas and the pawn business.
I finished Amitav Ghosh’s Sea of poppies. Up to his usual excellent standard, although this time he’s writing a trilogy, and this was just the first, so we’ll see.
Finished a Dance of Dragonsand am now caught up on Song of Fire and Ice. Have now started The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out of the Window and Disappeared by Jonas Jonasson – so far I’m quite enjoying it.
I’ve just read The Windup Girl, by Paolo Bacigalupi, which won the 2009 Nebula Award and the 2010 Hugo award. It’s a post-apocalyptic novel set in Bangkok, and the titular windup girl is only one of the protagonists: she’s a discarded Japanese sexbot trying to survive in a very hostile environment. The book has a fascinating setting and the writing is quite good, but I found the characterizations a little unsatisfying.
I’m still working on 1Q84, which has been really good so far. I’m adding Republic, Lost: How Money Corrupts Congress–and a Plan to Stop It by Lawrence Lessig and The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined by Steven Pinker to my slate.
Re-read Stephen King’s The Dead Zone - it had been many, many moons since I’d read it or seen the movie (still haven’t seen the TV version) and I’d forgotten all but the bare bones. It was interesting to see basically the same question posed in 11/22/63 posed here - the difference being that Jake Epping knows what Oswald will do, while Johnny Smith isn’t quite so sure. I really enjoyed revisiting this novel & would recommend it to those who aren’t into King’s horror works, but are still looking for a compelling story with believable characters.
I’ve also started the audiobook of King’s latest The Wind Through the Keyhole: A Dark Tower Novel - I’m still not completely sold on King’s reading (his voice grates a bit for me) but the story itself (both the frame story and the flashback story) has pulled me right in. I’m probably only about 15% in, but am quite enjoying it so far, tho am wondering if I should have read Dark Tower 1-4 again, first. Regardless, it’s nice to visit with Roland and his ka-tet again…
Finished Sister Carrie, by Theodore Dreiser. Very good but not quite up there with his An American Tragedy. Still a worthwhile read.
Moving on now to his Jennie Gerhardt.
Mrs Robinson’s Disgrace: The Private Diary of a Victorian Lady by Kate Summerscale.
I read her previous book, The Suspicions of Mr Whicher, and loved it. This one is just as good, though fairly different. Ms Summerscale is rapidly becoming one of my favourite non-fiction writers.
True crime, legal drama, women’s rights in Victorian England… with disgressions into all sorts of interesting areas, such as the quackery that passed for medicine at the time. Fascinating stuff.
Finished *The Hawk Eternal *the second book of the Hawk Queen Novels and one of Gemmells lesser novels. As I mentioned up thread I really like David Gemmell, but he is overly fond of the time-travel plot device and it made this novel a complex mess.
Started the The Clockwork Vampire Chronicles which I would have totally skipped over if a friend hadn’t recommended it to me. The title just sounds cheesy. But I am enjoying it so far and in some ways it reminds me of Gemmell’s Legend.
I really liked The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher. Thanks for posting because that does look interesting and my VAL (VERY AWESOME LIBRARY) has it in e-book format.
I didn’t like Mr. Whicher. I thought it was a bit too dry, maybe because Summerscale stuck to the facts. I wanted some speculation, some of her thoughts. The case was interesting though, and maybe I’ll try this one.
I’m reading The Last Policeman by Ben H. Winters.
It’s pre-apocalyptic. When the story starts, it’s been about a year since a new comet was discovered, and about six months since it was learned that the comet will hit Earth.
The story is set in New Hampshire, and the main character is Henry, a young cop recently promoted to detective. He’s investigating what looks to be a suicide (there’ve been lots of those) but he suspects it was murder.
The author is gradually revealing what’s been happening around the world since discovery of the comet. That, and Henry’s engaging personality, makes the story really interesting.
Finally finished House of Rain: good book, but a bit of a slog. I’ve started Blood and Thunder, by Hampton Sides: a bio of Kit Carson and the conquest of the West. Very well written history of not only Carson, but the events taking place during his lifetime, such as the war against the Navajo Nation and Mexico, and the aggressive pursuit of Manifest Destiny.
I recently finished Gone Girl. I really liked it and now I want to read Gillian Flynn’s other two books, but I’m on the waiting list for both and there’s a ways to go.
Now I’m just over halfway through The Age of Miracles. The earth keeps spinning slower and slower and no one knows why, but it messes with gravity and the length of days and other stuff. It’s from the point of view of a girl who’s 11 or 12, but I don’t think it’s supposed to be a young adult book. It keeps me wanting to know how it will end up, but the story itself is decent but not great. It’s a short and easy read though. I heard it compared to The Lovely Bones, and the style is similar.
Finished a Dance with Dragons. I’m now reading Imagining Mars by Robert Crossley. I’ve wanted to read a book like this for a long time, about our developing imagined imagery of Mars. I also breezed through a reprint of Rbert Baden-powell’s Scouting for Boys, the original 1908 Boy Scout Manual, predating my first edition of the American Boy Scoyt Manual by two years. Fascinating stuff, illustrated with examples of Scouting and Scout-like activities from the colonial areas of India and South Africa.
I’m ginishing up my audiobook version of Robert Fagles’ translation of The Aeneid, too.
I remember that in Hildegarde Dolson’s comic memoir We Shook the Family Tree, the young Dolson moves to New York in 1929 and one day sees someone walking a dog she later learns belongs to Theodore Dreiser. She remarks on how sad and unhappy the dog looks. She’s told, “You should see Dreiser.”
That’s paraphrased; I don’t know where the book is right now. I’m reading The Fifth Servant by Kenneth Wishnia, a murder mystery set in the Jewish ghetto of 16th-century Prague. I now want to go back and read the author’s other books, set in modern-day New York.
On my son’s recommendation, I read Middlesex, by Jeffrey Eugenides. I had read, and enjoyed, The Marriage Plot beforehand. I thought Middlesex was really excellent: an interesting story, well-drawn characters, funny when appropriate, an excellent sense of place (well, places I suppose). Definitely worth reading.
Just finished this. Favorite anecdote: One Labour parliamentarian, asked to choose between the hard-drinking George Brown and the ultraliberal Harold Wilson to lead the party, said, “George drunk is better than Harold sober.”
Pimlott also wrote, “It is a distressing fact about political decisions that there are people who make them. Distressing, that is, to the considerable number of other people who would like to, but don’t.”
Back to A Dance with Dragons now, and also reading some of Stephen King’s short story collection Nightmares & Dreamscapes.