Beth, you know I feel the same way about Eddings, so I’ll just weigh in on that and call it good. Sometimes you just want to be entertained, and I’ve always found those books to be pure escapism at its best.
I’ve done a lot of research into the trashy romance genre lately, but I’m going to bypass all that and try for something at least a little dignified. I’ll cast another vote for Gregory’s The Other Boleyn Girl, I found it absolutely fascinating, and at times almost painfully real.
I also recently read Neil Gaiman’s American Gods. I had been a little leery of it, because I had tried to read Neverwhere and not made it, but Gods is now on my list of books I must push on others. Especially for anyone with even the slightest interest in ancient mythology.
I’m currently working my way through Charlaine Harris’ Southern Vampire series–the first book is called Dead Until Dark, followed by Living Dead in Dallas and Club Dead. Thoroughly amusing take on the supernatural, with a good solid mystery behind it and a heroine with a realistic thought process, despite the fact that she’s a telepath. It’s not War and Peace, but I read to enjoy myself.
Just finished From These Ashes: The Complete Short Sci-Fi of Fredric Brown. It included a story I always liked and hadn’t known the author of, called The Arena, so I was happy to run across that. There were also a lot of stories that were only a page or a paragraph long. Those were of limited effectiveness, but it was interesting to see what could be done in such a short form.
I’m a big Fredric Brown fan. A book of his complete short SF stories would have to be pretty big (even with the short length of his works). I have quite a large collection of his stuff, which extends to fantasy and crime fiction, as well. His crime fiction is well worth ferreting out. I highly recommend The Fabulous Clipjoint, which won an Edgar, and Carnival of Crime, a collection of his short crime fiction. In one story, the victim is — the Reader! You have to read it to see how he does it.
I just finished An Open Book by Michael Dirda. It’s a memoir by a book reviewer and editor at The Washington Post Book World (who, I should mention, I know slightly) of the first twenty years of his life. He grew up in a working-class family with parents neither of whom were big readers. Despite that, he eventually got a Ph.D. in comparative literature and won a Pulitzer for reviewing. I recommend it if you like memoirs of childhood or if, like me, you became a bookworm despite having parents who weren’t so themselves.
I just finished Dry by Augusten Burroughs. AND YES I would recommend it to anyone. It’s a moving look at the process of becoming dry… in other words quitting drinking. And at the same time he shows what alcoholism does to the famliy and loved ones of the alcoholic. I remember reading the end and thinking “God, this is exactly what Scott_evil described in his thread about quitting!” It was a funny book and a moving one and I cried at the end.
Now I am almost finished with * Blood sucking Fiends * by Christopher Moore. As usual it is beyong hilarious. And so much more fun than the moody, sulky baroque Anne Rice!
Sometimes you just want to be entertained, and I’ve always found those books to be pure escapism at its best.