Wednesday reading

[jinian]

Minimally coherent reading meme time!

Currently I am reading Deerskin, because I read Chalice yesterday and it was Just The Thing, and I emailed rushthatspeaks saying mostly in jest that I should try Deerskin as comfort reading because comfort is unpredictable. Nope! Deerskin is predictably upsetting! Almost cried at lunch, sad all afternoon. But I read more on the couch when I got home, and there were blessings and baths and puppies, so that's better and I am looking forward to finishing it when I go to bed.

Some people do not like Chalice I guess? It's very reserved as a book, but Mirasol is reserved and so are basically all the other characters, it works for me. Plus I love bees, I would like to keep some bees someday.

Before that I read Baby Remember My Name: an anthology of queer girl writing, edited by Michelle Tea. Around halfway through, I thought to myself, so I am guessing Michelle Tea lives in San Francisco, and her solicitation for this anthology was largely based in San Francisco, because fuck is there a lot of San Francisco in this book. (Her bio proves me correct on the first supposition at least.) I was rolling my eyes pretty hard by the end. Also a lot of sex work, which, okay, I get that queer people often do that but it's mostly not people I know so to have it be overwhelming was weird. Some of the writing was too poetical for me, and most of the bits I liked cut off abruptly. Nice to see economic and racial diversity, though.

Karen Joy Fowler's We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves was amazing; I have liked her other novels pretty well, but this one blew me away and I don't want to spoil it, just go read. (I get the impression that I'm a philistine for not having this kind of reaction to Sarah Canary, but oh well.)

Also there was Robin Hobb's Blood of Dragons, which seems to be the last of the current batch of books, in which cranky-ass deformed dragons and their disadvantaged keepers trek up the world's nastiest river in search of a new home. It is a soap opera. On a scale of zero to Nana it is like 9. [*] When I mentioned it to skygiants she expressed trepidation about revisiting Robin Hobb at all, which is legit! I myself am afraid to reread the Assassin books after how fucking awful Soldier Son was! (Also I mean a person grows up, which is more the point.) But I was never emotionally attached to the Rain Wilds books, which is what these mainly relate to, so I felt myself fairly safe here. (The Tawny Man books get major side-eye from me, if that helps futher calibrate my Robin Hobb attitude for anyone?) There is a dragon in here that I think is a dragon from the Assassin books, though, which means DANGER WILL ROBINSON I might have to reread those to see what I think about that. Can it be more ill-advised than Deerskin though? And that's turning out okay in the end!

Um a while ago I read Rainbow Rowell's Fangirl, which was not the thing of heart-wrenching glory that Eleanor and Park is. It is cute and fun, though. The best thing about it is that she made up a whole Harry-Potter-esque fandom for her characters to be fans of, and there are excerpts, and now people on the internets are making little comics and sketches of Simon Snow and his adversary Baz and his two friends Agatha and Penelope. If I could draw humans worth a damn I would probably be doing fan art myself, just because I am so taken with the meta of it all.

Longer ago than that I read Mirabile, which everyone should do at all times. When they're not reading Hellspark anyway.

Books I bought this last long time: Only presinks! Which somehow the clerk was surprised that I had read them both first. I said, come on, how else do you know who needs to read them? (The Fowler for Wim's dad and stepmom; Rachel Hartman's Seraphina, which is now purple and I disapprove, for my mom.)

[* ETA: wait I just realized, this is totally The Real World: Rain Wilds River. brb loling forever]

Comments

[skygiants]

I had a strong emotional attachment to the Rain Wilds books! But I don't remember much of anything about why or how, except dragons and talking ships and I think there was a bratty girl who went through character development and became awesome? I should have put that last thing on my 'ideal piece of fiction' list.

[jinian]

Yes you should.

This one has bratty dragons, but they grow up into arrogant awesome beasts rather than women, so now I'm curious how you'd respond to that. Malta is in it, but I never liked her much so I can't speak to how well she's presented here; mostly she's anxious about her dying baby.

[umadoshi]

Ohmygosh, Deerskin. I haven't read it since high school, probably, and I still own a copy, but my memory tells me it's a lovely book that I likely don't ever need to read again.

And I forgot all about Chalice (*puts library hold on it*) and that McKinley has a new book out!

I remember being fond of Robin Hobb's stuff up to a certain point and then disliking something newish enough that I stopped reading her and never went back. Do I have even the faintest idea what that point was, and/or how it might tie into the current book? No. (Well, I know I read at least two trilogies? But after that it's all fuzzy. It's been a long time.)

[jinian]

Man, Deerskin. It is great, but so upsetting! Not just the incredibly brutal rape part, though of course that's a lot to deal with, but the end is scary too.

I would actually recommend against reading McKinley's latest, Pegasus, at this time, because it's first in a trilogy and stops really abruptly. But if you're not expecting a standalone, unlike those who read it when it came out, you could probably read it sans rage!

I seem to recall you having a substantial to-read pile that should theoretically allow you to forever ignore the existence of Robin Hobb, so it's all good. :)

[umadoshi]

Ah! Thanks for the heads-up on Pegasus. I can probably deal, but I would hate to find that out late in the game. (Although at the rate I'm working through my backlog, the whole trilogy could be out before I get to it. >.<)

Adding that and Chalice to my holds list puts me at about 210 books on hold, plus the unread ones I own, plus the ones of my Goodreads list that aren't in the library system. *checks stats* And right now I'm reading my 35th novel of the year, which is pretty representative of how much I get read these years. ;_; So I think it's safe to say I am never going to conquer the to-read list, which makes me very sad.

[gwyneira]

There is actually a newer McKinley, which I thought was pretty good! It's called _Shadows_ and came out a couple of months ago.

(I tried _Pegasus_, found it incredibly slow, and then found out it wasn't even a standalone and gave up. Maybe when/if she finishes the other books.)

I do like _Chalice_, in a quieter way than I like some of her earlier books; the bees are great. I love _Deerskin_, but wow, hard to reread too often.

[jinian]

Wow, she does not have that on her own web site. Thanks!

[oyceter]

I love Deerskin, and I guess I might do parts of it as comfort reading (esp. the bits about healing and recovery and DOGS), but OMG the beginning is brutal. And when she confronts her father again.

I saw Hobb was doing books in the Rain Wilds and was so conflicted! I really liked bratty girl in the original but hated rapist pirate and conflicted multiple personality ship (Paragon?), so... not sure. Also, Robin Hobb, you have burned me a lot!!