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Lily Fairbairn
Half-elven
Oct 17 2017, 4:06pm
Post #1 of 10
(567 views)
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It's the Ides of October reading thread!
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Well, almost... 
I'm still listening to Donna Leon's By Its Cover and am nearing the end. The case of the stolen and vandalized books is getting more complex, and someone has been murdered. This is not only an intriguing mystery, but I'm enjoying the exotic (to me, anyway) setting of Venice. I'm also enjoying how the main character, Commissario Brunetti, is not one of the deeply damaged detectives who has become a cliché in mystery fiction but a family man with a wry sense of humor.
On paper, I've set Cavalier aside for the moment and am just about to finish up Skeleton Man by Tony Hillerman. I'm not sure if this is his next-to-last book, but it's certainly the next-to-last one I haven't read. This plot is based on the true story of two airliners colliding over the Grand Canyon in 1956, although Hillerman's present-day repercussions are fictional. I always enjoy Leaphorn, Chee, and now Manuelito in action, and I always enjoy the landscapes and Navajo (and other) viewpoints.
A new Archaeology magazine just came in, and last month's Smithsonian is still sitting on the coffee table, so I can see what I'll be reading next.
So what have you been reading?
Where now the horse and the rider? Where is the horn that was blowing?
Where is the helm and the hauberk, and the bright hair flowing?
Where is the hand on the harpstring, and the red fire glowing?
Where is the spring and the harvest and the tall corn growing?
They have passed like rain on the mountain, like a wind in the meadow;
The days have gone down in the West behind the hills into shadow....
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Annael
Immortal
Oct 17 2017, 10:27pm
Post #2 of 10
(517 views)
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it leapt out at me at the library. I enjoyed Brust's Vlad Taltos series for the first 10 books or so, then it got boring, so I skipped a couple. This is the latest and the story line has not moved along noticeably. There's a whole lotta buildup to the climax, with Vlad going here and there and having conversations with a lot of people, most of which are cryptic as Brust doesn't want you to know what's going to happen, punctuated by fight scenes. The earlier novels were much better. I think he's stuck because he's more or less locked himself into doing 19 books in the series, so he's drawing things out.
Just picked up "All the Light We Cannot See," which I'm told is excellent.
I am a dreamer of words, of written words. I think I am reading; a word stops me. I leave the page. The syllables of the words begin to move around … The words take on other meanings as if they had the right to be young.
-- Gaston Bachelard
* * * * * * * * * *
NARF and member of Deplorable Cultus since 1967
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Kelly of Water's Edge
Rohan
Oct 18 2017, 7:25pm
Post #3 of 10
(486 views)
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From Beirut to Jerusalem by Tom Friedman
[In reply to]
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A Political Science classic.
I'm familiar with Friedman from his years of being the go-to commentator invited to the round table on Meet the Press whenever things heat up in the Holy Land, but he's better known for Pulitzer Prize winning work for the New York Times. Mods, feel free to delete if this is too political, but there's really no way to talk about a poli-sci book without talking politics.
Friedman discusses his time in Lebanon and Israel, some of the former particularly horrific. He argues that the Israeli/Palestinian conflict can only be ended with major, painful concessions on both sides. Israel will have to accept that it cannot maintain it's current borders and still remain both Jewish and democratic considering the birth rate of the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank, and the Palestinians will have to accept that those who lived within the pre-1967 UN agreed Israeli borders are never going home again and Israel will not allow it real military power. Both sides will have to unite in not allowing occasional fanatic terrorists on both sides to derail the process, while making real efforts to curb terrorism as much as possible. Friedman is hopeful but realistic about the difficulties involved, and that this is not at all a simple issue. A worthwhile read for anyone trying to understand the region.
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Meneldor
Valinor
Oct 19 2017, 2:47pm
Post #4 of 10
(468 views)
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Not much new material for me. I love the tale and lament that it's unfinished. As always, I'm left wanting more.
They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters, these see the works of the Lord, and His wonders in the deep. -Psalm 107
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Otaku-sempai
Immortal
Oct 19 2017, 4:07pm
Post #5 of 10
(467 views)
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We are past mid-month so you are either right on time or a little late. 
I do have some unread books in the reading pile now, so I really should finish up with the Hellboy novel that I've been re-reading at work.
"Far, far below the deepest delvings of the Dwarves, the world is gnawed by nameless things. Even Sauron knows them not. They are older than he."
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Lily Fairbairn
Half-elven
Oct 19 2017, 4:41pm
Post #6 of 10
(459 views)
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You're right: I'm a little late 
Where now the horse and the rider? Where is the horn that was blowing?
Where is the helm and the hauberk, and the bright hair flowing?
Where is the hand on the harpstring, and the red fire glowing?
Where is the spring and the harvest and the tall corn growing?
They have passed like rain on the mountain, like a wind in the meadow;
The days have gone down in the West behind the hills into shadow....
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Darkstone
Immortal
Oct 19 2017, 6:36pm
Post #7 of 10
(452 views)
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Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse. Read this as a kid and didn't get it. Now I'm older, or rather old, and I do. I think. Wisdom can't be given. It's experienced. Or maybe I'll better understand it in another 50 years.
-Recommended.
Dracula by Bram Stoker. Another book I read as a kid. Now I see the true monster that freaked all the Victorians out was not Dracula, but Lucy. Or at least her sexuality. Good little Mina, though, was a nice little girl, so she got to live.
-Recommended.
The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner. Revisited this novel yet again and an epiphany hit me: Caddy Compson and Lucy Westenra! Sexy Lucy dies in Dracula because of the strong Victorian aristocracy. Sexy Caddy survives because of the weakening Southern aristocracy!
-Recommended.
Yesterdays War (Volume 1) by Gerald Hall. In 2040 massive worldwide nuclear exchanges doom humanity to extinction. Simultaneously a young, wealthy, handsome, intelligent, athletic, popular, well-loved, thoughtful, trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent (i.e., Marty Stu) Australian industrialist invents a portal back to 1918. Taking a lot of portable wealth, a solar powered laptop, and several hard drives full of history and technical data, our hero goes back in time to try to influence history and prevent the development of nuclear weapons. A very intriguing concept. But...
It is recommended by some experts that aspiring writers should occasionally read a bad novel. Well, here you are. The dialogue is stilted, the characters one-dimensional, and the author spends a lot of time describing the technical details of his hero’s inventions. I mean, paragraph after paragraph of the description of a battlecruiser including tonnage, armor thickness, armament, boilers, generators, fire control, etc., etc. A lot of potential is wasted. For example our hero doesn’t consider taking along any of the highly intelligent and skilled scientists and technicians of the research facility that discovered the portal back with him because it would be too dangerous. (Hey! They’re all going to be dead within a couple of years because of nuclear winter anyway. How is that certainty not *more* dangerous?) Additionally after going back to 1918 the author just about immediately hand-waves a two year jump in time and our hero is suddenly rich and famous. It’d be nice to have followed the guy around a bit for those two years showing him getting acclimated to being a hundred and twenty years out of time and using his knowledge of the future! And I won’t even mention the insta-love story where the guy meets his perfect woman.
-Definitely not recommended.
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The audacious proposal stirred his heart. And the stirring became a song, and it mingled with the songs of Gil-galad and Celebrian, and with those of Feanor and Fingon. The song-weaving created a larger song, and then another, until suddenly it was as if a long forgotten memory woke and for one breathtaking moment the Music of the Ainur revealed itself in all glory. He opened his lips to sing and share this song. Then he realized that the others would not understand. Not even Mithrandir given his current state of mind. So he smiled and simply said "A diversion.”
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Lily Fairbairn
Half-elven
Oct 19 2017, 8:18pm
Post #8 of 10
(439 views)
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I originally read Dracula many years ago, and recently re-read it by way of listening to the audiobook. It was considerably less scary this time around, and not just because the vampire trope has been done to death (no pun intended.)
This time, the class and gender distinctions really jumped out at me, especially the overbearing condescension toward the woman. Yes, Mina was the good little girl, the amenable child, and so wasn't threatening.
So there went another classic novel down the drain of, well, experience.
Speaking of which, I read Siddhartha for a college class and remember nothing of it, although I did sit up one day in the midst of writing a growing-up-gaining-wisdom (and thereby saving the planet) sf novel and realized I'd named the heroine Sidhra.
Where now the horse and the rider? Where is the horn that was blowing?
Where is the helm and the hauberk, and the bright hair flowing?
Where is the hand on the harpstring, and the red fire glowing?
Where is the spring and the harvest and the tall corn growing?
They have passed like rain on the mountain, like a wind in the meadow;
The days have gone down in the West behind the hills into shadow....
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Darkstone
Immortal
Oct 19 2017, 9:23pm
Post #9 of 10
(435 views)
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I noticed the ship Dracula came to England in was the Czarina Catherine, named after the Russian ruler Catherine the Great, a woman of reportedly considerable sexuality as opposed to the more sedate reputation of good Queen Victoria.
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The audacious proposal stirred his heart. And the stirring became a song, and it mingled with the songs of Gil-galad and Celebrian, and with those of Feanor and Fingon. The song-weaving created a larger song, and then another, until suddenly it was as if a long forgotten memory woke and for one breathtaking moment the Music of the Ainur revealed itself in all glory. He opened his lips to sing and share this song. Then he realized that the others would not understand. Not even Mithrandir given his current state of mind. So he smiled and simply said "A diversion.”
(This post was edited by Darkstone on Oct 19 2017, 9:25pm)
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Aunt Dora Baggins
Immortal
Oct 20 2017, 8:56pm
Post #10 of 10
(412 views)
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I saw the movie and decided I had to read the book. Turns out its a series of 12 volumes, of which 4 or 5 are available on kindle. I'm in the middle of the second one.
Once upon a time there were four children named John, Susan, Titty and Roger (no, it's not Narnia, and yes, her name is Titty). They are on holiday in the Lake District in the 1920s and sail their boat to an island in the lake, where they set up a camp for several weeks. This was before the days of helicopter parenting, though their mother does visit them every few days.
On the island they are explorers, and meet two "pirates", girls in another boat, and have a battle for possession of the island. There's also a man living on a houseboat who is the girls' uncle but who they call Captain Flint. The kids give themselves nautical titles like "First Mate Susan" and "Able-bodied Seaman Titty", and the author refers to them by title more often than by name, as in "The Able-bodied Seaman caught a fish".
I love the strong girl characters, refreshing in books written so long ago. In the second book the two neighbor girls are forced to go on a carriage ride by their aunt, and they have to wear white frocks, and it's utterly jarring because we're used to thinking of them as pirates who always wear red caps and trousers.
The title comes from the names of the two boats, and the two crews. The four siblings are the Swallows, and the two pirate girls are the Amazons. Their names are Nancy and Peggy. Nancy's real name is Ruth, but when she's a pirate she can't be Ruth because pirates are ruthless.
I was reminded, especially in the first book, not only of Narnia but also of Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn being pirates on the island. I'm totally hooked and want to read all the volumes I can find.
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GNU Terry Pratchett
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"For DORA BAGGINS in memory of a LONG correspondence, with love from Bilbo; on a large wastebasket. Dora was Drogo's sister, and the eldest surviving female relative of Bilbo and Frodo; she was ninety-nine, and had written reams of good advice for more than half a century."
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"A Chance Meeting at Rivendell" and other stories
leleni at hotmail dot com
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(This post was edited by Aunt Dora Baggins on Oct 20 2017, 9:02pm)
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