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| 2008-06-05 19:06 |
| Things I Read During May |
| Public |
| Dar Williams—Highway Patrolman |
| books, didread |
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Got my computer back, so I might as well do my book post.
Things I Read During May
( Under the cut! )
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| 2008-04-01 23:52 |
| Book post has a posse |
| Public |
| Polara—Jetpack Blues (radio mix) |
| books, didread |
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Things I Read During March
( All aboard. )
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| 2008-03-05 00:47 |
| Things I Read During February |
| Public |
| The Mountain Goats—New Monster Avenue |
| books, didread |
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Things I Read During February
( I'll go ahead and cut this one. )
So, looks like I turn 26 today.
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| 2008-02-09 22:33 |
| Things I Read During January |
| Public |
| Nedelle—The Natural Night |
| books, didread |
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My Things I Read During 2008. Let me show you them.
Things I Read During January
Sean Stewart—Perfect Circle (1/5)
A Texas ghost story by one of the guys responsible for Beast and I Love Bees. Yes, it's as good as that sounds. A funny and scary book about family, music, dead folk, and irreparably screwing your life up. Highly recommended.
Gene Wolfe—"Unrequited Love" (short story) (1/18)
Overdramatic narration. Bit of a bait and switch. Still affecting and creepy. (Poor sad Aibo.)
Michael Bishop—"The Pile" (short story, free at link) (1/20)
HUH. Not entirely sure what to make of that.
Elizabeth Bear & Sarah Monette—A Companion To Wolves (1/24)
So look, there's this guy Vethulf, from over in Arakensberg. Short temper; been snapping at Isolfr's friends all the time. Isolfr got fed up, and wound up kicking or tripping him or something.
Later, while Isolfr slogged beside the mare that Frithulf slept astride, he smelled blood and flinched sharply. And then looked up, realizing he had been more or less dozing on his feet, and felt a warm hand on his shoulder. Vethulf, the quarrelsome, the fleet-footed, Vethulf-in-the-Fire walked beside him, his gray wolf slogging more like a carthorse than a predator.
Vethulf said nothing at first, just thrust a stake into Isolfr's hand. One quarter of a skinned raw rabbit was threaded on the pointed end; the blood smirched Isolfr's mitten.
"No time to cook," Vethulf said. "But I didn't see any signs of worms when I butchered it."
The meat was still warm, steaming slightly. Frithulf woke at the voices and looked around blearily. "Are we attacked?"
"You're fed," Vethulf said. He gave Isolfr another bony fragment of meat on a stick—"for your shieldbrother"—and a whole unskinned coney for Kothran and Viradechtis to share.
He fell away into the column before Isolfr could blink the thought of thanking him into his bleary mind, and Isolfr looked up at Frithulf in supplication. "What was that about?"
"Stay pretty," Frithulf advised, through a mouthful of meat.
I was spending an inordinate amount of time trying to decide which one of the possible reviews of this book I cared to write, and then I remembered this scene and realized I could probably skip the review altogether.
No really, check it out: You've got the dirt, muck and hardship; you've got the hothouse social atmosphere of a warrior band; and you've got the persistent gender reversals that were the thing's original raison d'être.* (Look, see? He's the good girl who fascinates all the bad boys! He literally ends up dating the Leader of the Pack! Well, of the werthreat, at least. Seriously, how can you not love that.) It's good and it's clever; it deconstructs without biting the hand that feeds it. You should read it.
(Uh, fair warning, though: it is filthy dirty, so you need to show up to the party prepared for the viking gang bang. I am not kidding.)
The Apocalypse Reader, ed. Justin Taylor (1/26) (read a quarter to a third of the stories.)
It had a Kelly Link story I hadn't read before, so I went ahead and checked it out.
- Lovecraft pastiche is better than actual Lovecraft. That is what I have learned here. (Can you believe I'd never actually read anything by him? Strange.)
- Theodora Goss's "The Rapid Advance of Sorrow" was absolutely excellent.
- I am pretty sure I remember the specific internet kerfluffle that spawned Jeff Goldberg's "These Zombies Are Not a Metaphor." (Oddly enough, I think that one was indirectly Kelly Link's doing, too.)
- Yes, the Kelly Link story was good. But I think "Lull" makes a far better end-of-the-world story.
- Ursula K. LeGuin has a very dry sense of humor.
Posy Simmonds—Gemma Bovary (graphic novel; read parts, skimmed other parts.)
Cute artwork, irritating characters, dense and weirdly arranged text, deft and note-perfect eye for the bad behavior of the upper middle class, boring plot, weird cop-out ending. I think I like her short comics better? But damn, her art is great. Such an eye for expressions! So many sad-sack English people!
Martin Millar—The Good Fairies of New York (1/30)
What a strange little book—a lighthearted farce about music, flowers, fairies, Crohn's Disease, awful ex-boyfriends, race relations, alcohol, and jerking off to sleazy phone-sex ads on the TV.
The unrelentingly breezy and cheerful tone was quite charming, but the book overstayed its welcome. After the 20th time the flower was stolen, I was more than ready to call it a day.
various authors—the Shadow Unit teaser material and character LiveJournals
I don't know that I'd recommend reading all the way through Chaz's LJ (SO MANY COMMENTS), but I do rather like these characters. Looking forward to the "episodes."
Treasure hunters are advised that View ⇒ Page Style ⇒ No Style is your friend.
_____
* I can only say this because I cheated by reading both of the authors' Livejournals. You can play along, if you care to.
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| 2008-02-05 15:43 |
| And we will call it... this land. |
| Public |
| Havana Guns—She Always Goes Down |
| books, fanfic, firefly |
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Hey. Hey. Steven Brust just wrote a Firefly novel. Go download it.
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Things I Read During December
( Read more... )
And that's it for Things I Read During 2007! I think I clocked somewhere in the neighborhood of 60 novels and 25 graphic novels over the year.
So what did everybody think of this little exercise? I've been having fun with it, but I'm wondering whether to keep doing it. I mean, for one thing, I could probably be having approximately the same fun on something slightly more productive.
Poll #1113857 What's the word?
Open to: All, results viewable to: None Should I keep doing this?
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| 2007-12-08 16:34 |
| Things I etc. etc. |
| Public |
| stupor |
| The Loud Family—Rocks Off |
| books, didread |
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Please to enjoy some book reviews.
Things I Read During October
( Read more... )
Things I Read During November
( Read more... )
Special preview of Things I Read In December: Everyone should go read Charlie Stross's Halting State. And the new Scott Pilgrim.
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| 2007-11-14 00:14 |
| Adaptation, Howl's Moving Castle, and the breaking points of stories |
| Public |
| OK Go—What To Do |
| anime, books, essays, movies, writing |
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Hey, let's talk about Howl's Moving Castle. Specifically, let's talk about how bad the Studio Ghibli movie sucks. ( AND HE'S OFF! )
Haha... all right, sorry about that. This was one of those things where I felt like I was on the verge of grasping something really important, and it was somehow vital to my craft that I spend the time obsessively digging it out. You know how it goes.
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| 2007-10-04 20:35 |
| Things I Read During September |
| Public |
| Marvin Gaye—Lets Get It On |
| books, didread |
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I'm sorry, some day I will talk about something else. I basically spent September reading, so these posts are me flushing my system. Anyway, book reviews!
Things I Read During September
Yeah, remember what I said about the two-foot stack of YA? I brung it. And many other things. ( Read more... )
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| 2007-10-03 21:58 |
| I could probably use a "books" icon, couldn't I? |
| Public |
| The Loud Family—I've Been Craving Lately (Bonus Track) |
| books |
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Of course I'm not going to resist the book meme. (Taken from ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) w4lf. I'm sure someone somewhere has a clean version of this without my comments.)
These are the top 200 books most often marked as "unread" by LibraryThing's users (as of today). As usual, bold what you have read, italicise what you started but couldn't finish, and strike through what you couldn't stand. The numbers after each one are the number of LT users who used the tag of that book.
( And then he did so. )
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| 2007-10-02 21:23 |
| (no subject) |
| Public |
| Ted Leo & the Pharmacists—Sons of Cain (live) |
| books |
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So a link rolled in, via Daring Fireball, to the introduction to the 2007 Best American Essays, edited by David Foster Wallace. And it reminded me of two things:* One, I love DFW. I do, I do! I won't apologize for it anymore! And two, I love reading really good essays. I suppose I know what to do now, don't I.
_____
* Well, and a third: I do love footnotes.
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| 2007-09-20 22:57 |
| They woke up the neighbors' dogs and freaked out the cats. |
| Public |
| Sondre Lerche—Well, Well, Well |
| books, wildlife |
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Dear raccoons in the tree outside my window:
Kindly finish screwing and get the hell out of here. GOD.
Hearts,
NF
(Alternate punchline.)
In other news: BOOKS. Books, books, and more books, filling up every available piece of shelf space in my room. (It's finally getting chilly enough to make us think about firing up the stove, so the family hinted that I should finally unpack those boxes. WOE.)
( No, I'm sure it's not really as impressive as all that. But it sure cost a lot to ship. )
Oh, also, I sifted through the crate of children's LPs in the living room, just to see if I could find some of the stuff that I thought I might have hallucinated.
DAMN.
(Actually, I was at a party two months ago where Josh Aas decided to go ahead and spin a copy of Sesame Disco. True story.)
( More behind. )
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| 2007-09-04 18:01 |
| Re: Re: Going Postal |
| Public |
| books |
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And apparently there's a sequel soon?
I'm reflexively skeptical, but Lipwig was pretty great. And hell, if I'm going to trust anyone to handle recurring characters properly, it might as well be Pratchett.
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| 2007-09-02 23:06 |
| (no subject) |
| Public |
| They Might Be Giants—Particle Man |
| books, stop posting |
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Confidential to nightswatch: You were totally right about Going Postal; easily top-three material.
(Moneyquote: "An underdog can always find somewhere soft to bite.")
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I love libraries. If I'm going to be living in a place for more than a month or two, a library card is near the top of my "collect these powerful talismans" list.
I think I got my first library card when I was seven. I don't have it anymore; a few years after that, the Timberland system split its database off from the Evergreen and state government reference libraries and issued those purple cards as replacements. But I still remember what it felt like in my hand. It was green with white lettering, and instead of the tapered thin-profile form you can see on the current ones, it was as thick as a credit card, with a sharply-cut edge that showed a cross-section of its plastics (green on either side, white in the core). It was stiff, and would hurt your palm a little bit if you gripped it too hard. Which I sometimes did, simply to remind myself that I had a library card.
Anyway, the purple Timberland card that replaced it is the most venerable one I have right now, and I've had the number memorized since I was about 11. (Oh, hush up. Think about how many phone numbers and locker combinations you've had to remember, then get back to me with that raised eyebrow.) The MPL one (also memorized) has the classiest design, though the Cork City one gets big points for bilingualism. And my alumnus card takes home the "most ghetto" award.
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Among a few other errands, I went to Office Depot today to try this thing, and it totally works. I've never used those Mont Blanc rollerballs before, and it turns out they really do write like a dream. I got great big plans for this thing and that awesome fatty journal-book*** that selfishside and lexicology gave me.
So what else is new in life?
Things I Read In August
( Well, I read some things in August. )
* PPS: while we're on the topic of bollocks.
** Well, almost. Norse myth and the End of the World got filed elsewhere.
*** It's like an inch and a half thick!****
**** Oh, and pardon the ordering on these footnotes.
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| 2007-08-21 07:39 |
| TRL search plugin, for great happy bookfinding |
| Public |
| Nedelle—Let Me Explain |
| books, technobabble |
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Hey, Olympia/Lacey/Tumwater people: Go here!
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| 2007-07-23 20:11 |
| The Holy Quartet: Books, Bikes, Beer, and Bands |
| Public |
| Plumtree—Why Won't You Stop |
| bikes, books, minneapolis, money |
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And isn't it just typical of me that ten minutes after I spend $75 on mailing off my books, I go book-shopping?
Ryan and I went to Dreamhaven before both of us left (he sails off tomorrow), and I got Elizabeth Bear's Whiskey and Water, which I have been itching to read since finishing Blood and Iron. Which I also bought my own copy of today, because they had a signed one for $5. (Part of the back cover was scrunged up.) And I snagged a $1 hardcover of Brust's The Sun, the Moon, and the Stars, just because it was there and I liked it quite a bit.
Other expenditures for the day: Something like 40 bucks to replace the bent fucking axle on my back wheel (wow, how'd that happen?), $20 on food (mostly fruit)...
...and, uh, another 20 at Barnes and Noble for the new Harry Potter. (I had $1.50 on a gift card to use up, and they had it for $13 cheaper than Dreamhaven.) The plan is to not crack that fucker until I am safely loaded onto that westbound train. We'll see how that one holds up.
Anyway, I'm meeting Sanden in a little bit at the 331 club; we're gonna catch up a bit and see some old-timey band play.
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