Nearly finished David Copperfield (Dickens). I’d forgotten how great a writer he is. There’s a pithy, funny quotable quote on every second page. Still, it’s long though. Think I’ll make my next read a ‘short and snappy’.
Also started reading Tchaikovsky: A Self-Portrait (Orlova). I think it might be out of print now but managed to source a copy on the internet after reading the SD column on his death last week. Interesting so far.
And dipping into Opened Ground: Selected Poems 1966-1996 (Séamus Heaney). What a brilliant poet he is. You can really smell and feel the scenes he portrays. Beautiful.
Just finished New Tricks by John Levitt. This is the second in an urban fantasy series. Mason is both a jazz musician and a “practitioner.” He is a former/part-timer enforcer. Someone is trying to change bodies with practitioners, leaving them brain-dead.
The writing is functional and the characters are likable enough, but the plotting was clumsy. I guessed the culprit almost immediately and in the end the author is nearly punching you in the face with it. How anyone in the story didn’t see it, especially the protagonist, defies reality more than the magic.
I can’t say that I won’t read his future books, but I also can’t recommend that you do.
I just finished Dark Fire by CJ Sansom, the followup to Dissolution. The topic wasn’t as compelling as Dissolution, but the story and characters are really top-notch.
I don’t remember which Martha Grimes book I was reading when I last commented, but I’m up to I am the Only Running Footman, now. The last book kinda irritated me, so we’ll see.
I just started All the President’s Men by Woodward and Bernstein. I really don’t know much about Watergate, so this will be a revelation to me.
I have the first of those on my list - is the series consistently that good? I really enjoyed the first few of Steven Saylor’s Roma Sub Rosa books, but the later ones seem poorly written.
I’m a couple hundred pages into A Fire Upon the Deep. So far it’s okay. Not sure I’m buying the “zones of thought” thing.
I just finished Botany of Desire. The first chapter, on apples and the legacy of John Chapman, didn’t really appeal to me, but Polan’s chapters on marijuana and potatoes were insightful and interesting. I definitely saw the seeds of ideas that came to full fruition in Omnivore’s Dilemma.
I’m reading Jim Butcher’s Acedem’s Fury right now. Mostly because I know I’ll read it quickly and I haven’t picked out any other book that I REALLY want to read. I like this series so far, but not nearly as much as the Dresden Files.
I like these books too. I was thinking about getting his new book, Revelation, but some Amazon readers are saying it’s bloated. Maybe I’ll wait for a cheap used copy.
Dung Beetle, they don’t eat the whole meals. Don’t want to spoil things, but there is a very funny part later where Jane describes how she tries to dispose of some food without detection. (She fails.) And Michael is a runner, so he works off some of the calories that way. Jane has been very heavy, and last time I saw her was using a cane, but I think has lost some weight. They really don’t eat all the food, they just order and taste.
I’m going to start *American Eve: Evelyn Nesbit, Stanford White: The Birth of the “It” Girl and the Crime of the Century *by Paula Uruburu.
Reading Michael Pollan’s In Defense of Food propelled me into reading The South Beach Diet Super Charged, an eating and exercise lifestyle plan based upon the Mediterranean Diet, which seems most able to accommodate the primarily vegetarian, whole food approach Pollan describes.
The Redford/Hoffman movie is worth a look once you’re done, although obviously a lot gets left out. Then you might want to see Frost/Nixon, now playing in a theater near you. It’s a funny, witty look at Nixon’s yearning for rehabilitation and Frost’s yearning for a TV career boost. Great acting all around (Frank Langella should get an Oscar for his Nixon).
Just finished Mort, by Pratchett, which I enjoyed, and Heart, You Bully, You Punk, by Cohen, which I didn’t.
Also recently reread Under the Banner of Heaven, by Krakauer, and read Quiet, Please: Dispatches from a Public Librarian, by Scott Douglas, and *Napoleon’s Buttons: How 17 Molecules Changed History *, Le Couteur, all of which I loved.
Currently in the middle of Making Money (Pratchett again), and slowly going through Songs of the Gorilla Nation (Dawn Prince-Hughes), because I keep putting it down for other books.
Just started The Testament of Gideon Mack. It is slow starting, but came highly recommended from a friend. It has the feel of something that I may like, but may take a while to finish. But it does me good to read more “meatier” reads, I should do it more often.
Okay, don’t blame me. And several of these are definitely candidates for that parody site.
“When The Duke Returns” by Eloisa James
“The Pride of Hannah Wade” Janet Dailey
“Blackthorne’s Bride” Shana Galen
“Dangerous to Know” Barbara Taylor Bradford (who I’ve at least heard of)
and several by a Lisa Scottoline.
I’ve already tossed a few that were so Fabio-enhanced that I couldn’t even take them seriously enough to skim them. ack.
Just read Dave Gibbons’s big, beautiful, very informative, lavishly-illustrated Watching the Watchmen (Titan 2008), which I highly recommend for any fans of the graphic novel. Lots of cool details on its creation, alternate history, draft layout pages, dropped concepts, costume evolution, etc. Very cool.
Card in my opinion is a fast food writer better suited to young adult or teen audiences, I thought speaker was a better novel , only because of the concept of someone doing a eulogy that actually represented the disesased and telling it like it was.
Such and such died , in life he was a drunk , he abused his wife and kids and stuff like that. He makes up a nice tile in the mosaic of the sf world, but thats about it.
Now , on to 09
Finished Storm of Shadows by David Weber
Heavy on politics and is setting the stage for Harringtons retirement to the background, as well as a forewarning by the author that some of the material will be seen in future books as seen from other eyes.
Quite frankly I am hoping he (Weber) is training a new author to take over writing the series , as this one could quite frankly go another ten years before the saga is complete. With Jordan passing before he could complete his series , I am thinking this should be on Baen books future topics to bring up with DW.
declan
It’s one thing to a eulogy to just be the truth; it’s another to claim that spouting the truth somehow heals all wounds even when he’s announcing the dirty secrets of those still living.
This thread was created to deal with that fork in the conversation if you want more details from all sides.
Just read a children’s book, The Sign of the Sinister Sorcerer, by Brad Strickland, who is carrying on with John Bellair’s characters. It adhered faithfully to the old formula, but somehow didn’t seem up to par.
Next up was Summer Morning, Summer Night, a collection of Ray Bradbury short stories (and scraps, some were only three or four sentences long). There wasn’t anything special here, and some of them I’d read before, but it all had that Ray flavor I was looking for. If he wants to go on publishing, I’ll go on reading.
Currently reading The Horror Stories of Robert E. Howard. Really wonderful pulp horror (and western, and adventure) tales. The illustrations by Greg Staples are just marvelous.
Finished The Good Soldier, by Ford Madox Ford. Very good. Sexual intrigue among an American and a British couple, set largely in Germany in the Edwardian era.
Next up: The Bonfire of the Vanities, by Tom Wolfe.
