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Catching up, after missing a few weeks of posts (either because I hadn't finished anything recently or because I wasn't online on Wednesday):
What are you reading now?
Leviathan Wakes, by James S. A. Corey. Space opera, the sort where the action begins with the seemingly random nuking of a cargo spaceship that answers a distress signal, and ramps up from there. I'm near the end, and it's living up to expectations of lots of action and okay if not great characterization, complete with noir alcoholic cop.
North and South, by Elizabeth Gaskell. Much gentler, a story about a young woman uprooted when her father decides he can no longer be a clergyman, so he leaves his job and moves his family out of the rectory. I am less than delighted by this one, but will likely continue. (This is my current kindle book.)
What did you read recently?
Lucky You, by Carl Hiaasen. Airplane reading, and bought as such: this has a thriller-style plot with a lighter tone, despite the white supremacist thugs. The maguffin here is a multi-million-dollar lottery ticket. (I am flying again next week, and may look for another Hiaasen paperback; on the other hand, I am sure I won't want to reread this one.)
Linnets and Valerians, by Elizabeth Goudge. Pleasant YA fantasy set in rural England around the 1920s, with four siblings brought to England from India by their father, who then runs off to do Egyptology and leaves them with relatives. The fantasy aspects take a while to come clear; at first it's lonely kids running away and stealing a pony, winding up at an uncle's house, and what happens after. Yes, the uncle has a tame owl, but that's done very naturalistically: the owl doesn't glow or speak or anything, it flies around the library and eats tinned sardines. I don't remember who recommended this one, but thank you.
Divine Endurance, by Gwyneth Jones. This almost felt like two books stitched together: the first half feels like the story of one of the last children born on a devastated colony planet, and raised by an apparently immortal talking cat, and her quest to find anyone else alive. The second half is about the hidden last daughter of a royal family, and her and other people's attempts to either live with a vague but oppressive foreign regime (known only as "the Rulers") and their local collaborators, or resist, as things seem to be falling apart all around them. The girl from the first half is there, and turns out to be not quite human, and powerful in vague ways, at least partly symbolic. The ending is odd. Recommended, but if at all possible find a hardcopy: the kindle edition (labeled as the "Flowerdust edition," after a drug found within the story) was badly scanned/entered and poorly proofread, enough to be problematic.
Osiris, by E. J. Smith. This is a post-disaster novel set in a city consisting of skyscrapers anchored in the ocean floor, most of whose inhabitants believe they are the last humans alive on Earth (though some people believe the land may still or again be habitable). It's divided between a poor/refugee quarter, where people tend to die young of hunger or cold, and the much more prosperous main city; the story follows an activist from the refugee quarter and a socialite from one of the ruling families of Osiris, who spends most of the book trying to find her missing twin brother and refusing to admit that he may be dead. She and the reader gradually see both the fragility of Osiris, which has no way to replace necessary hardware, and no seaworthy ships that can risk more than local fishing, and that much of what she has been taught is untrue or at least questionable. The worldbuilding was plausible long enough to get me through the story, though less convincing when I stopped to think about it (only so much can be explained by the revelations in-story), and I was irritated by chunks of the plot that depended on characters refusing to talk to each other. Yes, they have reasons, and I can believe people would do this: but I disliked them for it. I think this is Smith's first novel, and based on it, I look forward to what she does next (and might even notice it, though "Smith" is a common enough name that I may lose track).
What are you going to read next?
I have no idea: it's likely to depend on what catches my eye at a bookshop and/or on Amazon or Project Gutenberg, given that I'm noving in a week and not going to borrow any more books from the NY Public Library (I will finish Leviathan Wakes and return it and Linnets and Valerians no later than Saturday).
What are you reading now?
Leviathan Wakes, by James S. A. Corey. Space opera, the sort where the action begins with the seemingly random nuking of a cargo spaceship that answers a distress signal, and ramps up from there. I'm near the end, and it's living up to expectations of lots of action and okay if not great characterization, complete with noir alcoholic cop.
North and South, by Elizabeth Gaskell. Much gentler, a story about a young woman uprooted when her father decides he can no longer be a clergyman, so he leaves his job and moves his family out of the rectory. I am less than delighted by this one, but will likely continue. (This is my current kindle book.)
What did you read recently?
Lucky You, by Carl Hiaasen. Airplane reading, and bought as such: this has a thriller-style plot with a lighter tone, despite the white supremacist thugs. The maguffin here is a multi-million-dollar lottery ticket. (I am flying again next week, and may look for another Hiaasen paperback; on the other hand, I am sure I won't want to reread this one.)
Linnets and Valerians, by Elizabeth Goudge. Pleasant YA fantasy set in rural England around the 1920s, with four siblings brought to England from India by their father, who then runs off to do Egyptology and leaves them with relatives. The fantasy aspects take a while to come clear; at first it's lonely kids running away and stealing a pony, winding up at an uncle's house, and what happens after. Yes, the uncle has a tame owl, but that's done very naturalistically: the owl doesn't glow or speak or anything, it flies around the library and eats tinned sardines. I don't remember who recommended this one, but thank you.
Divine Endurance, by Gwyneth Jones. This almost felt like two books stitched together: the first half feels like the story of one of the last children born on a devastated colony planet, and raised by an apparently immortal talking cat, and her quest to find anyone else alive. The second half is about the hidden last daughter of a royal family, and her and other people's attempts to either live with a vague but oppressive foreign regime (known only as "the Rulers") and their local collaborators, or resist, as things seem to be falling apart all around them. The girl from the first half is there, and turns out to be not quite human, and powerful in vague ways, at least partly symbolic. The ending is odd. Recommended, but if at all possible find a hardcopy: the kindle edition (labeled as the "Flowerdust edition," after a drug found within the story) was badly scanned/entered and poorly proofread, enough to be problematic.
Osiris, by E. J. Smith. This is a post-disaster novel set in a city consisting of skyscrapers anchored in the ocean floor, most of whose inhabitants believe they are the last humans alive on Earth (though some people believe the land may still or again be habitable). It's divided between a poor/refugee quarter, where people tend to die young of hunger or cold, and the much more prosperous main city; the story follows an activist from the refugee quarter and a socialite from one of the ruling families of Osiris, who spends most of the book trying to find her missing twin brother and refusing to admit that he may be dead. She and the reader gradually see both the fragility of Osiris, which has no way to replace necessary hardware, and no seaworthy ships that can risk more than local fishing, and that much of what she has been taught is untrue or at least questionable. The worldbuilding was plausible long enough to get me through the story, though less convincing when I stopped to think about it (only so much can be explained by the revelations in-story), and I was irritated by chunks of the plot that depended on characters refusing to talk to each other. Yes, they have reasons, and I can believe people would do this: but I disliked them for it. I think this is Smith's first novel, and based on it, I look forward to what she does next (and might even notice it, though "Smith" is a common enough name that I may lose track).
What are you going to read next?
I have no idea: it's likely to depend on what catches my eye at a bookshop and/or on Amazon or Project Gutenberg, given that I'm noving in a week and not going to borrow any more books from the NY Public Library (I will finish Leviathan Wakes and return it and Linnets and Valerians no later than Saturday).
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