Amph What book are you reading right now?

Darlington Woods by Mike Dellosso.

 

The Hundred Days. An excellent, plot-heavy (for O'Brian) novel following Jack's appointment as commodore with a squadron tasked to secure the Mediterranean against several Bonapartist threats. There's plenty of action, both naval and political (and even a lion-hunting sequence), and it's all very good stuff.

It also finally ends the Napoleonic Wars, bringing Jack and Stephen's wartime service to an end, but not their story -- leaving them with the evergreen plot hook of Latin American independence. In so wrapping it up, O'Brian avoids grandiose gestures, but for making the questionable decision to kill off two major supporting characters with a remarkable lack of fanfare. Bonden, Jack's coxswain, the key supporting character among the seamen and an absolute fixture of the books, is killed offhand in the final battle and spared a sentence mentioning Jack's grief. And the book begins with observers watching the ships come in and mentioning that Diana, Stephen's extraordinary wife, died offscreen. Stephen's grief makes up a significant portion of the book, but in both cases it's an oddly distant approach to take for a series that has thrived on its and the audience's deep affection for and attachment to its cast and their emotional lives. Very unusual choices in a book that is otherwise an excellent examplar of O'Brian's typical style.

 

The Han Solo Trilogy II: Hutt Gambit

 

Schubert's Winter Journey: Anatomy of an Obsession by Ian Bostridge.

Schubert's 119th birthday was yesterday.

 

Steppenwolf. Currently the plan of attack is to alternate from "collection of Tolkien scraps" to "regular-ass book" and I've been meaning to read this one for a while. The fake editor's note has me hooked. After this, The Book of Lost Tales Vol. 1.

In audiobooks I've moved on to The Great Hunt and goddammit I'm going to stick with this for all 12 remaining books, aren't I?

Overall the current theme is:

 

The Force Unleashed

 

The Maltese Falcon

As a side bit of research to a project I'm working on I want to read at least some of the essential hard boiled detective novels.

 

I enjoyed it in fits and starts. There's more good than not, and what works, works exceptionally well, but I just couldn't gin up the enthusiasm to read the sequels. I do think it has great movie potential, however.

 

the second and third ones are a small step down in enjoyability from the first one, iirc, mostly due to pacing issues. they're still great, though. I think the fourth one is finally coming out this year, but the guy's been struggling with crippling depression since the second one came out so he's almost as slow to release new ones as rothfuss (******* rothfuss)

 

Star Wars: Shatterpoint

 

I think both pacing and expectations -- I went in hoping for more exactly like TLOLL, and got something different each time. I did note, though, when I reread RSURS I enjoyed it a lot more the second time.

 

Valis by PKD. A bit heavy-going

 

Yeah, I looked it up to see how far along the series had gotten and saw TLOLL was published in '06, the sequel in '07 and the third in '13 and thought "Ahhh, a case of George R.R. Martin". Sorry to hear he's been battling depression. Speaking of Rothfuss, I also gave his highly regarded The Name of the Wind a spin, but just couldn't get into it. Now that one I will try again. Just too many people have sung its praises not to. Heck, my favorite novel is Dune and it took three tries before I finally finished it.

I've forgotten so much about TLOLL at this point (It's been at least 4 years now since I read it) that I couldn't give RSURS a try without a refresher; another stumbling block for me continuing with the series.

 

Chew: Omnivore Edition Vol:4

 

wondering how they're gonna wrap that series. scheduled to end sometime this year. should be good, but since its a comedy series i guess the bar is lower than for a drama anyways

 

Human Croquet (1997) – Kate Atkinson



I am Isobel Fairfax, I am the alpha and omega of narrators . . . and I know the beginning and the end. The beginning is the word and the end is silence. And in between are the stories. This is one of mine.

Atkinson’s second novel is even trippier and stranger than her first book, which was pretty odd at times. Once again, the book is narrated by a young woman and it’s taken up with the mystery of her odd family. This sounds, so far, exactly like Behind the Scenes at the Museum, but this book is not as frequently heartbreaking, but still just as often hilarious. And it’s weirder, like I say. Isobel Fairfax is a young girl growing up. Her mother has disappeared so long ago that she no longer remembers her and she is desperate to know her mother’s fate. Likewise, Isobel is given to slipping through time, suddenly turning a corner, for instance, and finding herself in Shakespeare’s time. And then . . . well, let’s just say there’s a section about a Christmas party that I’m not even going to ruin for you, just . . . it’s ******* amazing and confounding and mind-blowing all at once. This book is less cohesive than Behind the Scenes at the Museum; I confess that I honestly didn’t understand a fairly large chunk of the last thirty pages or so. I couldn’t tell you what happens in those pages really and I also couldn’t really answer some of the questions people might expect to be answered. Take the Christmas party section for instance; I have no idea what was actually going on there. I couldn’t tell you what sense it made from a plot standpoint or from a metaphorical one either really. And frankly I don’t even know what I’m to make of Isobel Fairfax herself by the end of the book. But Atkinson’s writing is just so sharp and witty and immersive that I still absolutely love this book. If you’re a literalist or you just really can’t stand it when plot strands aren’t explained or wrapped up, then this is probably not the book for you. If, on the other hand, you like some magical realism and ambiguity sometimes, then this could not be a better book for you. This is a real masterpiece. It’s clear that this isn’t just a writer being weird for the sake of being weird. Everything in this book is there for a reason. I think it’s a book that would get better with every re-reading; I think a second, third, fourth reading would reveal more and more depth to the book, rather than simply unmasking Atkinson as a fraud. Regardless, it’s a magnificent book. On to the next one! 4 stars.

tl;dr – Atkinson outdoes her first novel for weirdness, trippiness and opacity, but the book is a brilliant experience if you simply let go of everything and let the current carry you. 4 stars.

More Book Reviews!

 

Finished Neil Gaiman's American Gods. I'll probably start and finish Cormac McCarthy's Child of God tomorrow, in the mood for a quick one.

 

The Essential Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson.

 

Reading an anthology called Meeting Infinity edited by Jonathan Strahan. It is a group of stories centering around future shock, fear of the rate of technological advancement.

 

Don Winslow's The Cartel. I read The Power of the Dog last year and thoroughly enjoyed it so I'm looking forward to finally digging in to the follow-up.

 

Blue at the Mizzen. The twentieth and final completed novel of O'Brian's Aubrey-Maturin books, it's yet another pleasure. With the Napoleonic Wars over, Jack and Stephen finally put the series' longest-running plot thread to bed by heading to Chile, ostensibly on a hydrographic surveying mission but secretly intended to build and support the burgeoning independent Chilean navy. First there is much fussing about at home, where Jack picks up a new midshipman -- the illegitimate son of the future William IV -- and on the African coast, where Stephen courts the governor's lovely young widow, who happens to be an acquaintance, fellow naturalist, and great admirer of his. Hanson, the midshipman, is an excellent addition to the cast, ably filling a protege role and contributing to the various dynamics aboard ship -- midshipmen learning skills, promotions to master's mate, officers dying and needing to be replaced, who does and doesn't get along -- that add so much liveliness to the narrative. And it's wonderful to see Stephen moving through his grief and returning to his hopelessly romantic self before he begins managing affairs in Chile. And while the ending sets up further adventures, it also, like the previous book, delivers a powerful sense of closure, perhaps spurred by O'Brian's realization, in his eighties, that he couldn't guarantee further books. The mission is complete, and just before the series ended O'Brian snuck in Jack's long-awaited promotion to admiral. After following these characters for so long, I can say that it's a worthy ending, even though I wish it would never end.

 

The Great Zoo of China by Matthew Reilly. If you liked Jurassic Park you'd probably like this. It's just out in paper here in the UK. A lot of Reilly's books are part of series but this is a standalone.

 

Taking a break from the Bible and reading The Finest Hours. It's really good so far. It has a different tone than the movie. It has more of a you-are-there docudrama vibe, whereas the film is more of a slow burn character piece.

 

Havac, are you going to read 21?