Archer is very erratic nowadays. His very best books, I’d say, are First Among Equals (about British politicians vying to become prime minister), Not A Penny More, Not A Penny Less (a very clever revenge fantasy), and his short story collections A Quiver Full of Arrows, A Twist in the Tale, and Twelve Red Herrings. Going to prison, alas, has not improved his skills.
I’m enjoying some Diana Wynne Jones right now - I did enjoy the Miyazaki adaptation, but Howl’s Moving Castle is a fantastic read. There are also two companion novels (about the same characters.) I have a rather unpleasant and boring task here at work today, with long waiting-about periods, which are made much more pleasant by the novel tucked into my bag. 
The Gates was fun. It’d be a good Halloween read for the family.
Just finished the intro to Demons by Dostoyevsky, and hope it’ll keep me engaged until Under the Dome arrives mid-November.
I don’t THINK I was claiming that, but my punctuation is ambiguous, I guess.
I’m going on a trip next week and was trying to sort out a couple of books to take with me, when I accidentally got sucked in and read a big chunk of Johannes Cabal, the Necromancer (picked up on the strength of Khadaji’s recent review). Very very enjoyable. If it finishes up reasonably well, I’ll look for more books by this author in future.
Next up: She Got Up Off the Couch: And Other Heroic Acts from Mooreland, Indiana
by Haven Kimmel. This interests me because…oh, hush! 
This is a sequel to the wonderful A Girl Named Zippy.
I stayed up half the night last night reading this and I’ll probably stay up half the night tonight finishing it. If I fall asleep in my frosted flakes tomorrow morning, it’ll be on your head, araminty. What a marvelous book!
I always read these threads, but don’t always post what I’m reading – most of it isn’t worth specifying by title, and I take my reputation as a recommender of books very seriously. (Yes, dammit, I am the person who introduced English Passengers to the Dope.)
Just finished a book that’s not just worth naming, it’s worth recommending: The Selected Works of T.S. Spivet by Reif Larson.
You can tell when you pick it up that it’s not just another novel; it’s slightly bigger than the standard octavo book. The increased size – mostly side-to-side – is necessary because of the extensive marginalia.
T.S. is a 12-year-old cartographer from Montana whose drawings and diagrams are good enough to be published in Discover and similar magazines. They’re good enough, in fact, that he wins the prestigious Baird Prize from the Smithsonian. (His mentor, a professor at a local university, had nominated him.) T.S. at first hesitates – he’s about to start seventh grade – but decides to travel to D.C. to accept the prize; he leaves home without saying anything to his parents and hops a freight train to travel East.
The narrative is about the journey – which, as novelistic journeys tend to be, is both literal and metaphorical – and about family dynamics (T.S.'s brother Layton had died in an accident soon before the novel opens) and family history (he reads in a journal of his mother’s on that journey).
The narrative is not just narrative, however. Interspersed on almost every page are T.S.'s maps (and this is a boy who maps almost everything, from his sister shucking corn to his top nine favorite movies and their thematic relationships to the change in the lengths of men’s shorts over time) and drawings, as well as textual asides. He helpfully draws dotted lines from the text to each bit of marginalia so you know when to read them.
The text alone is worthwhile, but the overall presentation lifts the book into something very, very special. The collaboration between Larson and his designer/typographer, Ben Gibson – who isn’t listed on the title page, but should be – is a tour-de-force. (I’ve overseen enough layouts to know that there’s way more involved than handing over a Word doc and a few jpegs and saying “put this on a page.”)
Well worth reading.
Twickster, I’ve heard good things about that book, and will remember to pick it up.
Just started The Wordy Shipmates by Sarah Vowell, and so far am not seeing the appeal. It was was so highly praised that I’ll stick with it, though; I’m only on page 13.
I’m a few chapters into Thomas Pynchon’s latest, Inherent Vice. I’m thoroughly enjoying it. If you have any affinity for noir-inspired books, The Big Lebowski, or Pynchon himself, I guess, pick it up. I am totally picturing Lassie from Psych as Bigfoot.
I recently finished 13 Bullets and 99 Coffins, the first two books in David Wellington’s vampire series. And I can’t wait to get my hands on the next two. I also read The Strain, by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan – more vampires. The Strain wasn’t bad. It wasn’t unputdown-able great either, but a decent read and I’d like to read the next two to see what happens.
Remembered another – The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters. Holy cats – I lost two nights’ sleep because I had to find out what was happening. I’m sure others have read and recommended this before, but I’m adding my two cents. Great descriptive writing, wonderfully articulated characters, a genuinely creepy story, and a well-paced plot.
False Economy: A Surprising Economic History of the World by Alan Beattie
How IS Pynchon in general? I have a copy of his Against the Day sitting on my shelf waiting to be read. It’s huge, and I’ve not started it yet because I’ve never read Pynchon before and want to get a handle on how much I’ll like it. I’m one of those people who has to finish a book once its started, and this is about the size of a small-town telephone book. It was given to me by someone who found it abandoned in his office – still looks brand new, untouched; this person works for a newspaper and figures it was going to be reviewed by someone but then got lost and forgotten.
Taming of the Shrew. It’s fun but Shakespeare could have been a little more original. It’s clearly a rip off of the movie 10 Things I Hate About You.
I enjoyed her Assassination Vacation as an audiobook. She has a quirky, puckish, semi-morbid love of history that put it right up my alley.
twickster, The Selected Works of T.S. Spivet sounds amazing! Thanks for the recommendation.
Sigmagirl, I enjoyed The Wordy Shipmates, but can see how it wouldn’t necessarily grab everyone. I find it a little more subdued than some of her other books that make people love Sarah Vowell.
And speaking of Sarah Vowell, I’m just finishing a book now that reminded me a little bit of her style. Inventing Niagara: Beauty, Power and Lies by Ginger Strand covers the history of Niagara Falls, and hits such high points as wresting it away from Tuscarora Indians, the development of the tacky tourist industry, hydropower, chemical waste, and gambling. I really like the author’s approach, it reminds me of an understated Sarah Vowell in some ways - but you know how Sarah Vowell is often making self-referential comments about how people slowly back away from her at parties when she starts talking about assassinations, and you’re kind of thinking “yeah, but you’re famous and in movies and hang out with celebrities so there’s some hyperbole going on there” … with Ginger Strand, I can imagine her being awkward at parties. In a nice way.
I also read Colson Whitehead’s Sag Harbor, a coming of age novel set in a summer town on Long Island in the 1980s, it was great. I’m becoming a creepy Colson Whitehead fangirl.
And in the kid lit category, White Sands, Red Menace by Ellen Klages which is her sequel to her totally awesome Green Glass Sea. This one takes place just after WWII, in Alamogordo during the testing of the Von Braun rockets. It’s maybe not quite as good as the first, but I would recommend them highly as a package especially to young girls who love science and technology.
Finished The Child Thief by Brom. This is a very dark retelling of the Peter Pan tale. However, I have not read the source material, only knowing the Disney version and so it may not be that much darker than the original. Indeed, the post notes by Brom pretty much make it clear that source material is darker than I knew.
This is a very mixed review. It had a lot of promise and at times I enjoyed it a lot. At times it dragged badly and as seems to often be my opinion, it was much longer than need be. The ending did not satisfy and towards the end I was simply longing for it to be over.
I will give this a C+ maybe even a B-, but I can’t say I am induced to seek out Brom’s work.
There’s Pynchon and there’s Pynchon. There’s dense Pynchon, such as Against the Day, Mason and Dixon, and Gravity’s Rainbow. These books are layered with symbolism, difficult to follow non-linear plots, and a near sadistic lack of exposition. I read Gravity’s Rainbow and enjoyed it as a stylistic tour de force, but I couldn’t make it 10 pages into Mason and Dixon. There’s also light Pynchon, such as Crying of lot 49, Vineland, and, apparently, Inherent Vice. These books are still pretty surreal, but they have exposition and plots that can be followed. Also the symbolism is much less dense. I’d recommend his first novel V, which is a mixture of both Pynchons. Also I’d recommend Neal Stephenson, who is like Pynchon, but without the contempt for the reader.
I’m reading a graphic novel (the first one I’ve ever read) called Logicomix An Epic Search for Truth, which is about 20th century mathematicians primarily Bertrand Russell.
I really enjoyed those books. The Hunger Games was on a lot of shortlists for YA prizes, and I read it because of that and enjoyed it immensely. Same with Graceling, by Kristin Cashore (which also has a sequel, maybe prequel out but I haven’t managed to get my paws on it yet).
Someone mentioned The Little Stranger. That book made me extremely uneasy. Good stuff.
I’m reading Oliver Twist (loving it) and getting ready to start a whole host of others.