April 2006 books
Jun. 18th, 2006 03:28 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jinianSong of Susannah (Dark Tower 6), Stephen King. Here's where I really noticed the effectiveness of the thematic sounds that sort of run through my head and make bookfeel. ("Commala" is the main one in the later books; "dod-a-chock" variants appear earlier and tie in at the end a little.)
The Dark Tower (Dark Tower 7), Stephen King. Even more meta than the previous volume, but it mostly worked for me. I don't really like either fork of the ending -- one feels too easy and one too hard, even with the lightening element.
Sewall Wright and Evolutionary Biology, William B. Provine. I read this because Sewall Wright was very mathematically smart and had a huge influence on population genetics. ... Okay, mostly I wanted to find out whether the rumor that his research and lectures on guinea pigs had led to his erasing a chalkboard with one, as I'd heard in lecture. The only comment on that in the book is far from the guinea-pig chapters, at the very end, in a caption for ths best-known picture of Wright. It reads, "Wright in 1954, the year of his retirement from the University of Chicago. This is the most widely reproduced photograph of Wright. He did not erase the blackboard with the guinea pig after this session. Wright denies that he ever erased a blackboard with one, despite the many anecdotes to that effect."
Crystal Soldier, Sharon Lee and Steve Miller. Library shelf. Pretty good actiony space opera. First half of a book only.
King of the Wind, Marguerite Henry. From![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
rachelmanija for feeling of place in Morocco. I don't think I read this one during my horse-book phase. Unsurprisingly, it is good.
The Witch in the Well, Sharan Newman. Library shelf. The jacket copy made this sound like it was about one cool mystery-solving woman in medieval France, but the book was much more about her entire extended family and their interactions within a mysterious situation. I liked it.
Windfall, Rachel Caine. Library shelf. Another entry in the mainstream-yet-paranormal-chick subgenre, this one is apparently fourth in a series. Human Wardens (magic-users) hold enslaved Djinn to boost their powers and allow them to control the weather. Our chick is currently working as a TV weather girl and forbidden to use her powers, though she still gets to have hot vanilla sex with her Djinn. Actually, this was remarkably difficult to put down because of the good mystery plot, though the stupid angst was pretty annoying.
Kitty and the Midnight Hour, Carrie Vaughn. Closeted werewolf runs a radio call-in show about the supernatural, negotiates with supernaturals in power, tries to catch human-mauling werewolf who's screwing things up for everyone. Somewhat fluffy, some good looks at pack relationships. I'm not sure it's worth hunting up sequels when they come out, but it was fun.
The Risen Empire and The Killing of Worlds, Scott Westerfeld. Political intrigue, romance, and nanotech battles in a galactic empire, very well done. Plus an AI and a sympathetic emotionless character, hurrah!
redRobe [sic], Jon Courtenay Grimmwood. Dismaying nonce-orthography plus the Seven Deadly Words. It might be worth picking up in a non-paying context just to read the intro and laugh out loud at it, though.
Solstice Wood, Patricia McKillip. I haven't read Winter Rose, so I don't have the problems with the location retcon that others have mentioned. I didn't love this, though; I thought the fantastic elements and the language use suffered by being turned to a modern setting. There were some lovely moments regardless.
Fledgling, Octavia Butler. Disturbing sex, young yet badass woman, critically important power relationships. Typical excellent Butler.
Deathstalker Legacy, Simon R. Green. Overwrought space opera, emphasis on the opera. Cliche and ridiculous, yet still a lot of fun.
A Home at the End of the World, Michael Cunningham. From So Many Books, So Little Time. Ordinary people fall into unusual family structure.
The Wild Shore, Kim Stanley Robinson.rysmiel read the next of the Three Californias books, and it sounded interesting enough that I wanted to start at the beginning. (Turns out they're unrelated except in being extrapolated Californias, so out-of-order reading is fine.) This one is about an America very thoroughly beaten in war and policed by the Japanese to make sure their tech level and infrastructure stay unthreatening for a century. I wasn't crazy about any of the characters or the adventure-and-maturation plot, sadly, but it's well written. [The Gold Coast is really good, though.]
Scout's Progress, Sharon Lee & Steve Miller. From sib-out-laws' moving-time book giveaway. Yay for geek-girl protagonists. It appears that Liaden books do tend to be fairly romance-flavored, which is fine with me if I like at least one character. Popcorn book with high reread-while-sick value; glad I picked it up.
The Tomorrow Log, Lee & Miller. Same place. I liked this one less, but it was still fine.
The Book of Imaginary Beings, Jorge Luis Borges, ill. Peter Sis, trans. Andrew Hurley. Beautifully, mystically written fantastic zoology. Getting this from the library meant I couldn't just keep it around for browsing as the intro advises, but it was lovely to read straight through.
I Do/I Don't: Queers on Marriage, ed. Greg Wharton and Ian Phillips. This book will figure prominently in my years-delayed post on my problems with legal marriage. Don't hold your breath, though. Overall, the book is comprehensive, with lots of different opinions from lots of different people. And they're pretty much all right, which is why this is such a huge issue and I can't write about it well.
Shaman's Crossing, Robin Hobb. I'm reserving judgment until I read more of the series, except to wonder: Is Hobb on antidepressants now?
Boys Over Flowers 15, Yoko Kamio.
Ceres 13, Yuu Watase.
Fables: Homelands, Bill Willingham et al.
Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind 1, Hayao Miyazaki. Finally, an edition of the Nausicaa manga large enough to see! Thank you, Viz.
Runaways 4-I-think (True Believers), Brian K. Vaughan & Adrian Alphona.
Top 10 2, Alan Moore et al.
Top 10: The Forty-Niners, Alan Moore et al. Addresses the establishment of the city of superheroes appearing in the original Top 10 series, apparently as sort of a treaty settlement after WWII. I'm a poor judge of historical verisimilitude, but I found it convincing.
Yotsuba& 2, Kiyohiko Azuma.
The Dark Tower (Dark Tower 7), Stephen King. Even more meta than the previous volume, but it mostly worked for me. I don't really like either fork of the ending -- one feels too easy and one too hard, even with the lightening element.
Sewall Wright and Evolutionary Biology, William B. Provine. I read this because Sewall Wright was very mathematically smart and had a huge influence on population genetics. ... Okay, mostly I wanted to find out whether the rumor that his research and lectures on guinea pigs had led to his erasing a chalkboard with one, as I'd heard in lecture. The only comment on that in the book is far from the guinea-pig chapters, at the very end, in a caption for ths best-known picture of Wright. It reads, "Wright in 1954, the year of his retirement from the University of Chicago. This is the most widely reproduced photograph of Wright. He did not erase the blackboard with the guinea pig after this session. Wright denies that he ever erased a blackboard with one, despite the many anecdotes to that effect."
Crystal Soldier, Sharon Lee and Steve Miller. Library shelf. Pretty good actiony space opera. First half of a book only.
King of the Wind, Marguerite Henry. From
rachelmanija for feeling of place in Morocco. I don't think I read this one during my horse-book phase. Unsurprisingly, it is good.The Witch in the Well, Sharan Newman. Library shelf. The jacket copy made this sound like it was about one cool mystery-solving woman in medieval France, but the book was much more about her entire extended family and their interactions within a mysterious situation. I liked it.
Windfall, Rachel Caine. Library shelf. Another entry in the mainstream-yet-paranormal-chick subgenre, this one is apparently fourth in a series. Human Wardens (magic-users) hold enslaved Djinn to boost their powers and allow them to control the weather. Our chick is currently working as a TV weather girl and forbidden to use her powers, though she still gets to have hot vanilla sex with her Djinn. Actually, this was remarkably difficult to put down because of the good mystery plot, though the stupid angst was pretty annoying.
Kitty and the Midnight Hour, Carrie Vaughn. Closeted werewolf runs a radio call-in show about the supernatural, negotiates with supernaturals in power, tries to catch human-mauling werewolf who's screwing things up for everyone. Somewhat fluffy, some good looks at pack relationships. I'm not sure it's worth hunting up sequels when they come out, but it was fun.
The Risen Empire and The Killing of Worlds, Scott Westerfeld. Political intrigue, romance, and nanotech battles in a galactic empire, very well done. Plus an AI and a sympathetic emotionless character, hurrah!
Solstice Wood, Patricia McKillip. I haven't read Winter Rose, so I don't have the problems with the location retcon that others have mentioned. I didn't love this, though; I thought the fantastic elements and the language use suffered by being turned to a modern setting. There were some lovely moments regardless.
Fledgling, Octavia Butler. Disturbing sex, young yet badass woman, critically important power relationships. Typical excellent Butler.
Deathstalker Legacy, Simon R. Green. Overwrought space opera, emphasis on the opera. Cliche and ridiculous, yet still a lot of fun.
A Home at the End of the World, Michael Cunningham. From So Many Books, So Little Time. Ordinary people fall into unusual family structure.
The Wild Shore, Kim Stanley Robinson.
rysmiel read the next of the Three Californias books, and it sounded interesting enough that I wanted to start at the beginning. (Turns out they're unrelated except in being extrapolated Californias, so out-of-order reading is fine.) This one is about an America very thoroughly beaten in war and policed by the Japanese to make sure their tech level and infrastructure stay unthreatening for a century. I wasn't crazy about any of the characters or the adventure-and-maturation plot, sadly, but it's well written. [The Gold Coast is really good, though.]Scout's Progress, Sharon Lee & Steve Miller. From sib-out-laws' moving-time book giveaway. Yay for geek-girl protagonists. It appears that Liaden books do tend to be fairly romance-flavored, which is fine with me if I like at least one character. Popcorn book with high reread-while-sick value; glad I picked it up.
The Tomorrow Log, Lee & Miller. Same place. I liked this one less, but it was still fine.
The Book of Imaginary Beings, Jorge Luis Borges, ill. Peter Sis, trans. Andrew Hurley. Beautifully, mystically written fantastic zoology. Getting this from the library meant I couldn't just keep it around for browsing as the intro advises, but it was lovely to read straight through.
I Do/I Don't: Queers on Marriage, ed. Greg Wharton and Ian Phillips. This book will figure prominently in my years-delayed post on my problems with legal marriage. Don't hold your breath, though. Overall, the book is comprehensive, with lots of different opinions from lots of different people. And they're pretty much all right, which is why this is such a huge issue and I can't write about it well.
Shaman's Crossing, Robin Hobb. I'm reserving judgment until I read more of the series, except to wonder: Is Hobb on antidepressants now?
Boys Over Flowers 15, Yoko Kamio.
Ceres 13, Yuu Watase.
Fables: Homelands, Bill Willingham et al.
Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind 1, Hayao Miyazaki. Finally, an edition of the Nausicaa manga large enough to see! Thank you, Viz.
Runaways 4-I-think (True Believers), Brian K. Vaughan & Adrian Alphona.
Top 10 2, Alan Moore et al.
Top 10: The Forty-Niners, Alan Moore et al. Addresses the establishment of the city of superheroes appearing in the original Top 10 series, apparently as sort of a treaty settlement after WWII. I'm a poor judge of historical verisimilitude, but I found it convincing.
Yotsuba& 2, Kiyohiko Azuma.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2006-06-19 04:19 am (UTC)I'm so glad someone else read the Westerfeld duology! I love them so much, and I'm so sad that they don't seem to get much attention, because I think they're wonderfully written and crafted and exciting and thrilling and filled with sensawunda and great characters and great ideas all at the same time. Plus... it's an empire of zombies! What's not to like?
no subject
Date: 2006-06-19 04:21 am (UTC)Guinea pigs.
no subject
Date: 2006-06-19 05:14 am (UTC)I wonder where I am hearing about all these books. It's like I'm reading your posts or something! (I think the causation will be clearer when I am anything remotely like caught up on booklogging.)
Succession is really entertaining and impressive. I think a second reading is warranted (some time after I catch up with my zillion Wiscon recs). More Westerfeld for adults would be really nice. The YA stuff is good, but I think the scope of the story has been greater in his adult stuff so far. I have great hopes for the AIRSHIP BOOKS he is working on now. Airships!
no subject
Date: 2006-06-19 05:07 pm (UTC)Most people I know who have written much about the end of The Dark Tower not liking it have been upset about the Coda -
no subject
Date: 2006-06-19 05:54 pm (UTC)I am so excited about the airship books!