This was my most recent audiobook. A historical mystery, it features two brothers, Gustav & Otto Amlingmeyer, who are cowboys. At the beginning of the novel they are unemployed, and sign on to work at the Bar VR ranch, despite its bad reputation locally. The novel is narrated by the younger, known as Big Red, who becomes uncomfortably aware that his brother, Old Red, has an ulterior motive for taking the job: he is curious and wants to do some investigating. Old Red, you see, is an avid fan of Sherlock Holmes, and would like to try his hand at solving a mystery.
They are given the opportunity when one of the other ranch hands is found murdered inside the locked outhouse. The seedy and corrupt ranch manager wants to sweep it under the carpet, but Old Red manages to convince the ranch owner to give him a chance to figure out what happened. Big Red and Old Red spend the day running around poking their noses into everything and trying to avoid the ranch manager, who intends to kill them if he gets the chance.
It turns out, of course, that the matter is more complicated than a dead man in an outhouse. There is a lot more wrong at the Bar VR than just that, and of course Old Red manages to figure it out in time for a reveal scene where everyone is gathered together for the explanation. I think I figured things out before Old Red did, but it's hard to be sure because Big Red is our Watson--he reports what happens, but often has no idea what his brother is thinking. I often find the ignorant narrator in mysteries to be an annoying character, but not in this case. I liked both the Amlingmeyers, and the progression of their relationship through the story was interesting and moving.
Holmes on the Range was a very enjoyable story. I liked it despite my general dislike of historical fiction and my complete lack of interest in cowboys. And I even learned something - I had never heard of cattalo before, though I think I had heard of beefalo, which is the same thing. I thoroughly enjoyed Holmes on the Range, and will seek out more in the series. Good fun.
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Friday, January 21, 2011
The Cardinal's Blades by Pierre Pevel
Translated from French, this fantasy novel feels basically like The Three Musketeers with dragons. It is, alas, not my type of book. Which is too bad, because I sometimes like a good adventure story, but this one just isn't for me.
As for the plot, I only have the faintest idea what it's going to be about, as 125 pages in I was still waiting for the story to begin. At page 95 I began skimming, as nothing of any import or interest had happened to that point. It jumps from scene to scene, from character to character, every few pages. Really--the first 125 pages were 31 chapters, which is an average of four pages per chapter, and each one jumps to a different chatacter. This makes it both hard to keep them all straight and hard to give a damn about any of them, since we don't get much of a sense of any of them as people.
Further, the writing is very visual--whole paragraphs are devoted to describing what everyone looks like and how they dress and what they own and what their surroundings look like, but that gives me no idea of their character. As I have said here before, I don't visualize much as I read. I form very few images in my head, and I can't absorb descriptive passages. I've tried many times, and inevitably my mind skitters off and I think of other things and when I force my attention back to the book I discover that my gaze has traveled down the page, but I haven't absorbed any of it. Even when I force myself to go back and re-read and try to envision what's being described, I'm rarely successful. It's just the way my brain seems to be wired. And it seems that Pevel is my opposite--someone whose thinking is very visual.
The writing itself isn't utterly horrible, but it's mildly clumsy. There are plenty of lines like this: "The freebooters entered with a swagger, as thugs everywhere enter a room when they are certain they are danger personified." Or exposition like this: "And so we have returned to Hotel de l'Epervier, the House of the Sparrowhawk, which, as you can see, has lost none of its charms." Given that all three of the characters know exactly where they are, that was an As You Know, Bob moment of explanation for the reader.
I am frustrated enough with The Cardinal's Blades that I probably will not continue, but not because I'm disliking it, merely because it has left me bored and indifferent. To invoke the Eight Deadly Words, I don't care what happens to these people. I don't care about the plots and counter plots that the writer is clumsily hinting at. I haven't been given any reason to be interested in them, and if the story is only beginning 125 pages into the book, then the author started in the wrong place. The writing style is very much not my thing, but might work quite well for a different sort of reader. Not terrible, just really not for me.
As for the plot, I only have the faintest idea what it's going to be about, as 125 pages in I was still waiting for the story to begin. At page 95 I began skimming, as nothing of any import or interest had happened to that point. It jumps from scene to scene, from character to character, every few pages. Really--the first 125 pages were 31 chapters, which is an average of four pages per chapter, and each one jumps to a different chatacter. This makes it both hard to keep them all straight and hard to give a damn about any of them, since we don't get much of a sense of any of them as people.
Further, the writing is very visual--whole paragraphs are devoted to describing what everyone looks like and how they dress and what they own and what their surroundings look like, but that gives me no idea of their character. As I have said here before, I don't visualize much as I read. I form very few images in my head, and I can't absorb descriptive passages. I've tried many times, and inevitably my mind skitters off and I think of other things and when I force my attention back to the book I discover that my gaze has traveled down the page, but I haven't absorbed any of it. Even when I force myself to go back and re-read and try to envision what's being described, I'm rarely successful. It's just the way my brain seems to be wired. And it seems that Pevel is my opposite--someone whose thinking is very visual.
The writing itself isn't utterly horrible, but it's mildly clumsy. There are plenty of lines like this: "The freebooters entered with a swagger, as thugs everywhere enter a room when they are certain they are danger personified." Or exposition like this: "And so we have returned to Hotel de l'Epervier, the House of the Sparrowhawk, which, as you can see, has lost none of its charms." Given that all three of the characters know exactly where they are, that was an As You Know, Bob moment of explanation for the reader.
I am frustrated enough with The Cardinal's Blades that I probably will not continue, but not because I'm disliking it, merely because it has left me bored and indifferent. To invoke the Eight Deadly Words, I don't care what happens to these people. I don't care about the plots and counter plots that the writer is clumsily hinting at. I haven't been given any reason to be interested in them, and if the story is only beginning 125 pages into the book, then the author started in the wrong place. The writing style is very much not my thing, but might work quite well for a different sort of reader. Not terrible, just really not for me.
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
The Double Jack Mrders by Patrick McManus
The Double Jack Murders is the third in this series featuring Bo Tully, the sheriff of Blight County, Idaho. It follows The Blight Way and Avalanche.
Bo has a problem: Lucas Kincaid, a man Bo arrested, has escaped from custody and is gunning for Bo. He's nutty and dangerous, and the threat is very real. So when Bo is asked by an old friend to look into a cold case for her, he decides it would be a good time to go camping--not, as people seem to assume, because he's running away from Kincaid, but because he thinks it would be easier to hunt Kincaid down and kill him away from town. Bo is a basically honest guy, but not exactly the rule-following sort, and he isn't really interested in arresting Kincaid again.
So Bo goes camping with his ornery father, Pap, who used to be sheriff, and his friend Dave, who likes to think he's an Indian. They are interested in the disappearance of Bo's friend's father in the 1920s. He and his assistant were doing a little mining. One day they went to work on the mine before staking a claim on it, and they never returned. They figure out approximately where the old mine must have been, and set about searching for it. Eventually they find the answer to what happened to the missing men.
The joy of these books isn't really the mystery, though that was fine, and wrapped up in a satisfactory manner. The joy is the characters and the place and they way they see life. There is, for instance, the matter of an ornery little dog, and the boy who asks if he can come to a funeral because he's bored. I don't read these novels because they're riveting crime novels, I read them because I enjoy spending time in the county McManus is sharing with us. They're almost cosies, even though they're police procedurals. Overall, it's just a pleasant, feel-good read.
Bo has a problem: Lucas Kincaid, a man Bo arrested, has escaped from custody and is gunning for Bo. He's nutty and dangerous, and the threat is very real. So when Bo is asked by an old friend to look into a cold case for her, he decides it would be a good time to go camping--not, as people seem to assume, because he's running away from Kincaid, but because he thinks it would be easier to hunt Kincaid down and kill him away from town. Bo is a basically honest guy, but not exactly the rule-following sort, and he isn't really interested in arresting Kincaid again.
So Bo goes camping with his ornery father, Pap, who used to be sheriff, and his friend Dave, who likes to think he's an Indian. They are interested in the disappearance of Bo's friend's father in the 1920s. He and his assistant were doing a little mining. One day they went to work on the mine before staking a claim on it, and they never returned. They figure out approximately where the old mine must have been, and set about searching for it. Eventually they find the answer to what happened to the missing men.
The joy of these books isn't really the mystery, though that was fine, and wrapped up in a satisfactory manner. The joy is the characters and the place and they way they see life. There is, for instance, the matter of an ornery little dog, and the boy who asks if he can come to a funeral because he's bored. I don't read these novels because they're riveting crime novels, I read them because I enjoy spending time in the county McManus is sharing with us. They're almost cosies, even though they're police procedurals. Overall, it's just a pleasant, feel-good read.
Monday, January 17, 2011
Kill the Dead by Richard Kadrey
Kill the Dead is set about six months after Sandman Slim. Stark has returned to Earth from Hell, he has gotten revenge against the man who sent him to Hell, and now he's not quite sure what to do with himself. He works for a government agency exterminating dangerous supernatural creatures to earn money to pay the bills, as his video store is just barely hanging on. He lives with the animated head of Kasabian, a former friend who now keeps tabs on him for Lucifer. Mostly, though, Stark drinks and smokes and broods. In Sandman Slim, he was an immature, angry asshole. In Kill the Dead, he's a slightly less immature, depressed asshole.
Several things happen that force Stark out of his rut--someone killed a member of a formerly-powerful old magical family and he is consulted by the government agency he sometimes works for, there seem to be an unusual number of zombies wandering the streets, he meets a really hot chick who seems interested in him, and Lucifer is in town and expects Stark to be his bodyguard. Naturally this leads to a threat to the world, and Stark is the only one who can save us. Well, some of us. A lot of people die in this book, but not everyone dies, so Stark could be considered successful.
Regular readers of this blog are aware that I've been experimenting over the last five months or so with urban fantasy, trying to pinpoint what sorts of it I like and what I don't. This is the kind I like: very violent, not at all romantic, where the stakes are high, people die, and the main character isn't the center of the universe. It avoids many of the things that I dislike about urban fantasies, especially those with pretty young women who find out they are special snowflakes and find love along the way. However it does have one cliche that I sometimes see in urban fantasies with male protagonists, and it always makes me roll my eyes: the hot chick decides they can't be together because he's just too badass and dangerous for her. Stark is genuinely more dangerous than most characters I've run across, so this is less silly than usual. Still, it's an irritating cliche, and becomes more so every time I run across it.
The best thing about Kill the Dead, though, is the voice. The writing is witty and often funny. For instance, this bit, in which Stark asks Lucifer why he is visiting LA instead of in Hell:
Several things happen that force Stark out of his rut--someone killed a member of a formerly-powerful old magical family and he is consulted by the government agency he sometimes works for, there seem to be an unusual number of zombies wandering the streets, he meets a really hot chick who seems interested in him, and Lucifer is in town and expects Stark to be his bodyguard. Naturally this leads to a threat to the world, and Stark is the only one who can save us. Well, some of us. A lot of people die in this book, but not everyone dies, so Stark could be considered successful.
Regular readers of this blog are aware that I've been experimenting over the last five months or so with urban fantasy, trying to pinpoint what sorts of it I like and what I don't. This is the kind I like: very violent, not at all romantic, where the stakes are high, people die, and the main character isn't the center of the universe. It avoids many of the things that I dislike about urban fantasies, especially those with pretty young women who find out they are special snowflakes and find love along the way. However it does have one cliche that I sometimes see in urban fantasies with male protagonists, and it always makes me roll my eyes: the hot chick decides they can't be together because he's just too badass and dangerous for her. Stark is genuinely more dangerous than most characters I've run across, so this is less silly than usual. Still, it's an irritating cliche, and becomes more so every time I run across it.
The best thing about Kill the Dead, though, is the voice. The writing is witty and often funny. For instance, this bit, in which Stark asks Lucifer why he is visiting LA instead of in Hell:
Lucifer: "Why does anyone come to L.A.?"
Stark: "To kill people."
Lucifer: "No, that's just you. Normal people come here to get into the movies."
Stark: "You're in a movie?"
Lucifer: "Of course not. I'm here as a technical adviser. A producer friend is in preproduction for a big-budget film of my life story."
Stark: "Please tell me you're bringing Ed Wood back from the dead to direct it."
Lucifer: "This is strictly an A-list project. I'm disappointed, Jimmy. I thought you'd be more excited. You love movies."
Stark: "Why do you need a biopic? About half the movies ever made are horror flicks and aren't all horror flicks really about you? So, you already have about ten thousand movies."
Lucifer: "But those are metaphorical. Even the ones where I'm depicted, it's never really me. This will be the real thing. The true story. My side of the story."
Stark: "Don't take this the wrong way, but who fucking cares? Are there really enough Satanists and girls in striped stockings to pay for a flick like that?"
Lucifer: "It's a prestige picture, Jimmy. Sometimes a studio makes a movie it knows won't show a near-term profit because they know that it's the right thing to do artistically."
Stark: "You own the head of the studio, don't you? Someone sold you their soul for fame and power and hot and cold running starlets and this is them paying you off."
Lucifer: "It's only a partial payoff. I still own the soul."
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
Blind Descent by Nevada Barr
Blind Descent is the sixth in the Anna Pigeon series. Anna is a middle-aged ranger for the National Park Service. The mysteries take place at various national parks. This is the third of them I have read.
In Blind Descent, Anna has been sent to Carlsbad Caverns to assist with a cave rescue. The park has two large caves -- Carlsbad, which is open to tourists, and Lechuguilla, which is not. There is a group of cavers working in Lechuguilla, and there was an accident and one of them has a broken leg and needs to be carried out. Anna herself is not a caver, and she is there to serve as above-ground support. However she is then informed that the injured caver is a friend of hers from Mesa Verde, the park where she usually works, and that she is asking for Anna.
We find out that Anna has a deathly, overpowering, suffocating fear of enclosed spaces. This is hardly surprising, as in previous volumes I have also learned that she is terrified of Lake Superior and of fire. Why not caves, too? We all have our hot buttons and insecurities, but it seems that Anna has a neverending supply. Anyway, she agrees to go down into the cave anyway, and then we are treated to a long description of the rather complicated and dangerous trip into the cave, punctuated by Anna occasionally being paralysed by fear. Ho hum.
Things get better when they meet up with the group of cavers and other characters are introduced. Anna stops thinking about her fear constantly and only thinks of it periodically after that. We are introduced to Frida, her injured friend, and the people who were with her when she had her accident. Frida has a broken leg and is concussed, but she tells Anna that she doesn't think it was an accident: someone hurt her deliberately, though she has no idea who or why, and she's not even positive it was deliberate. They begin a long climb back out of the cave and along the way there is a landslide. Frida is killed, and Anna and another climber are injured. Anna is certain it wasn't an accident, either.
When she finally gets free of the cave Anna reports that Frida was killed to one of her superiors, who doesn't take her seriously. She decides to investigate on her own, and what happened from that point on made me realize how very much I dislike Anna Pigeon. She pokes around in other people's business, she lies, she spends hours speculating endlessly about who it might be and why, and then starts all over again. She accuses people without reason, she speculates aloud and incorrectly, she offends most everyone around her, and she is wrong about who did it. Anna Pigeon is a pain in the ass, and if I met her, I wouldn't like her any more than most of the other characters did. But I will say this: Barr appears to be aware that her character isn't likeable, and that is easier to take than if she was an ass who was portrayed as a hero.
I found it rather predictable, as well. I knew about five pages in that in the end Anna would end up alone in the cave in a confrontation with the killer, and I wasn't wrong. It was also very obvious when she went off to meet someone who apparently knew something that he would be dead when she arrived and again, I wasn't wrong. I don't know why Anna was so surprised.
I began listening to Blind Descent as an audiobook and, though Barbara Rosenblat is a wonderful narrator, after a while it really grated on my nerves. Audiobooks force you to take the story at a much more slow and deliberate pace than reading the book yourself. I could read a book like this in 3-4 hours, while the audiobook takes 12. When you're listening, you can't skim forward through the long descriptions of Anna's paralysing fear, or when she is being an ass, or speculating endlessly in circular arguments that lead nowhere. Disc 9 was chewed up enough to make it unlistenable, and I happily abandoned the audiobook for a paper copy, which allowed me to find out what happened much more quickly and with less irritation.
I'm not sure if I will continue with this series. I've done three in rapid succession, and that may have been a mistake. The thing is, Barr is a really good writer. She can actually sometimes make me see the landscape she is describing, and that is really quite extraordinary, given how infrequently I visualize what authors describe. The settings are interesting and varied. The secondary characters are, too. Many of the things Anna is doing in her job are also interesting. So really, I like everything about the books except the main character, and that's too bad. But if I continue I think I will go back to reading them myself rather than listening to them -- it's less irritating when I can skim when I want to.
In Blind Descent, Anna has been sent to Carlsbad Caverns to assist with a cave rescue. The park has two large caves -- Carlsbad, which is open to tourists, and Lechuguilla, which is not. There is a group of cavers working in Lechuguilla, and there was an accident and one of them has a broken leg and needs to be carried out. Anna herself is not a caver, and she is there to serve as above-ground support. However she is then informed that the injured caver is a friend of hers from Mesa Verde, the park where she usually works, and that she is asking for Anna.
We find out that Anna has a deathly, overpowering, suffocating fear of enclosed spaces. This is hardly surprising, as in previous volumes I have also learned that she is terrified of Lake Superior and of fire. Why not caves, too? We all have our hot buttons and insecurities, but it seems that Anna has a neverending supply. Anyway, she agrees to go down into the cave anyway, and then we are treated to a long description of the rather complicated and dangerous trip into the cave, punctuated by Anna occasionally being paralysed by fear. Ho hum.
Things get better when they meet up with the group of cavers and other characters are introduced. Anna stops thinking about her fear constantly and only thinks of it periodically after that. We are introduced to Frida, her injured friend, and the people who were with her when she had her accident. Frida has a broken leg and is concussed, but she tells Anna that she doesn't think it was an accident: someone hurt her deliberately, though she has no idea who or why, and she's not even positive it was deliberate. They begin a long climb back out of the cave and along the way there is a landslide. Frida is killed, and Anna and another climber are injured. Anna is certain it wasn't an accident, either.
When she finally gets free of the cave Anna reports that Frida was killed to one of her superiors, who doesn't take her seriously. She decides to investigate on her own, and what happened from that point on made me realize how very much I dislike Anna Pigeon. She pokes around in other people's business, she lies, she spends hours speculating endlessly about who it might be and why, and then starts all over again. She accuses people without reason, she speculates aloud and incorrectly, she offends most everyone around her, and she is wrong about who did it. Anna Pigeon is a pain in the ass, and if I met her, I wouldn't like her any more than most of the other characters did. But I will say this: Barr appears to be aware that her character isn't likeable, and that is easier to take than if she was an ass who was portrayed as a hero.
I found it rather predictable, as well. I knew about five pages in that in the end Anna would end up alone in the cave in a confrontation with the killer, and I wasn't wrong. It was also very obvious when she went off to meet someone who apparently knew something that he would be dead when she arrived and again, I wasn't wrong. I don't know why Anna was so surprised.
I began listening to Blind Descent as an audiobook and, though Barbara Rosenblat is a wonderful narrator, after a while it really grated on my nerves. Audiobooks force you to take the story at a much more slow and deliberate pace than reading the book yourself. I could read a book like this in 3-4 hours, while the audiobook takes 12. When you're listening, you can't skim forward through the long descriptions of Anna's paralysing fear, or when she is being an ass, or speculating endlessly in circular arguments that lead nowhere. Disc 9 was chewed up enough to make it unlistenable, and I happily abandoned the audiobook for a paper copy, which allowed me to find out what happened much more quickly and with less irritation.
I'm not sure if I will continue with this series. I've done three in rapid succession, and that may have been a mistake. The thing is, Barr is a really good writer. She can actually sometimes make me see the landscape she is describing, and that is really quite extraordinary, given how infrequently I visualize what authors describe. The settings are interesting and varied. The secondary characters are, too. Many of the things Anna is doing in her job are also interesting. So really, I like everything about the books except the main character, and that's too bad. But if I continue I think I will go back to reading them myself rather than listening to them -- it's less irritating when I can skim when I want to.
Saturday, January 8, 2011
Bitter Seeds by Ian Tregillis
In a nutshell, Bitter Seeds is an alternate history of World War 2 in which British warlocks are using their powers against the Germans.
It is told from both sides of the war. Klaus, his sister Gretel, and a handful of others were taken in by a creepy German doctor in their childhoods and experimented upon. Those who survived now have, basically, super powers. They have wires running from their skulls which are attached to battery packs, and so long as the batteries are charged they have a variety of powers such as great strength, control over fire, or to be able to pass through other objects. When the second world war breaks out, they are used to help with the invasion of France. Beyond that, though, the Germans seem unsure what to do with them. Gretel, however, is different. She is precognitive - she knows what's going to happen, and at times she offers very good information to the military. But she is also manipulative, and uses her knowledge to arrange things to her advantage.
The British intelligence service becomes aware of these mutant super soldiers, and are very concerned. Thinking that their powers are unnatural, they seek specialists, and consult a warlock. Once the British government becomes aware of the warlocks, the genie is out of the box and cannot be put back in. The government will use every tool at its disposal, and damn the consequences and how many people it destroys.
Bitter Seeds is aptly titled - the story is very bitter, indeed. I usually avoid alternate history, but I'm glad I read this one. I can't say I exactly enjoyed it, but I was interested enough to keep going and get through to the end. What makes this novel is Gretel. We don't see that much of her, and never know exactly what she is thinking. But it is clear that she has a plan, and I wanted to see what she was doing and why. I was only partially satisfied, in that I still don't know why she did some of the things she did. But it was certainly an interesting, if not pleasant, journey.
Bitter Seeds is really quite good. There is a good chance that this one will end up on my Hugo nominating ballot. Recommended, while noting that this is not a happy book.
It is told from both sides of the war. Klaus, his sister Gretel, and a handful of others were taken in by a creepy German doctor in their childhoods and experimented upon. Those who survived now have, basically, super powers. They have wires running from their skulls which are attached to battery packs, and so long as the batteries are charged they have a variety of powers such as great strength, control over fire, or to be able to pass through other objects. When the second world war breaks out, they are used to help with the invasion of France. Beyond that, though, the Germans seem unsure what to do with them. Gretel, however, is different. She is precognitive - she knows what's going to happen, and at times she offers very good information to the military. But she is also manipulative, and uses her knowledge to arrange things to her advantage.
The British intelligence service becomes aware of these mutant super soldiers, and are very concerned. Thinking that their powers are unnatural, they seek specialists, and consult a warlock. Once the British government becomes aware of the warlocks, the genie is out of the box and cannot be put back in. The government will use every tool at its disposal, and damn the consequences and how many people it destroys.
Bitter Seeds is aptly titled - the story is very bitter, indeed. I usually avoid alternate history, but I'm glad I read this one. I can't say I exactly enjoyed it, but I was interested enough to keep going and get through to the end. What makes this novel is Gretel. We don't see that much of her, and never know exactly what she is thinking. But it is clear that she has a plan, and I wanted to see what she was doing and why. I was only partially satisfied, in that I still don't know why she did some of the things she did. But it was certainly an interesting, if not pleasant, journey.
Bitter Seeds is really quite good. There is a good chance that this one will end up on my Hugo nominating ballot. Recommended, while noting that this is not a happy book.
Friday, January 7, 2011
Dead to Me by Anton Strout
Is this YA? It sort of feels like it.
Young and stupid psychic fellow gets a job as an agent for a secret government agency that handles paranormal events in New York City. A broad smear of what a wacky place it is to work, a mention of the drudgery of working for the government, and hints of vicious and mysterious office politics at the upper levels. A bit like a clumsy rough draft of The Atrocity Archives by Charles Stross, except not intelligent, funny, clever, subtle, or entertaining.
Young and stupid psychic fellow gets a job as an agent for a secret government agency that handles paranormal events in New York City. A broad smear of what a wacky place it is to work, a mention of the drudgery of working for the government, and hints of vicious and mysterious office politics at the upper levels. A bit like a clumsy rough draft of The Atrocity Archives by Charles Stross, except not intelligent, funny, clever, subtle, or entertaining.
Monday, January 3, 2011
Black Wings by Christina Henry
A moderately tedious paranormal with angels. Like many of these stories, our protagonist works at the edges of the magic world, but discovers herself to be more of a special snowflake than she had imagined. And then she turns out to be even more special than that. She reacts to her new circumstances and amazing new powers by mouthing off and having temper tantrums like a toddler. Ho hum, seen that plenty of times before. Why are so many heroines of these stories so unlikeable, and mostly in the same ways? Parts of it felt stitched together from things borrowed from other sources and the bits that seemed original were just tedious.
More seriously, she has only two friends. One of them is killed at the beginning, and it seems to have no real effect on her emotional world except as an excuse to fight with her boss. Who is an annoying guy, but turns out actually to be attracted to her. She's got the hots for someone else she probably can't have. So by the end we have the requisite love triangle. And add dream sequences - and goodness I do hate flashbacks and dream sequences - and we're just not on a good trajectory. And, though there are lots of fights and lots of bystanders get killed, I didn't ever particularly worry about her ability to survive, because with each encounter she seemingly developed amazing new powers from nowhere. She kept surviving, only to pass out and be cared for by the hot hunk she shouldn't have. Sigh.
More seriously, she has only two friends. One of them is killed at the beginning, and it seems to have no real effect on her emotional world except as an excuse to fight with her boss. Who is an annoying guy, but turns out actually to be attracted to her. She's got the hots for someone else she probably can't have. So by the end we have the requisite love triangle. And add dream sequences - and goodness I do hate flashbacks and dream sequences - and we're just not on a good trajectory. And, though there are lots of fights and lots of bystanders get killed, I didn't ever particularly worry about her ability to survive, because with each encounter she seemingly developed amazing new powers from nowhere. She kept surviving, only to pass out and be cared for by the hot hunk she shouldn't have. Sigh.
Saturday, January 1, 2011
2010: The Year in Reading
Every year at this time I review what I've been reading for the past year. I started keeping a list of my reading in 2000, and have found it quite interesting, as my assumptions about my reading are not always accurate. For instance, for years I assumed that I read a lot more science fiction and fantasy than mysteries, but that's not true. For the purposes of my list-making, I only count books I finished, and I do not count re-reads.
I read a lot more this year than I have in any year since I began keeping records. This is partly because I bought an ebook reader this year, which makes reading more convenient, and gives me much faster access to books. I used to drive to the bookstore and hope they had what I wanted, or order books online and wait up to a week and a half for them to arrive. Now I pick something out and can be reading it five minutes later. Much faster access to books means I read more. But I was on a fast pace for the year even before I bought the ebook reader: I read 72 books in the three and a half months before I bought my Nook. The Nook just made it even easier to keep up that pace.
In 2010 I read a whole lot of gay fiction: gay romance, gay mystery, gay paranormal, gay horror. Many of these were shorter than an average science fiction or mystery novel, so they went fast and helped get the count up. I also dove into the depths of urban fantasy and paranormals, with mixed results. I have concluded that I really do like some of the genre, if it's the right type, but most of it isn't the right type. The average UF, to me, tends to be somewhere between bad and so-so, but those rare gems are really great. I'm glad I decided to explore, or I never would have discovered the awesome Mercy Thompson novels by Patricia Briggs. I also brushed the surface of heterosexual paranormal romance, but my sampling has been disheartening.
So, on to the numbers:
I finished 253 books and scripts this year.
11 were regular science fiction
27 were crime or mysteries
45 were fantasy or urban fantasy
10 were scripts
139 were gay fiction of some sort
The remainder were general fiction, nonfiction, or hetero romance
It's hard to pare down a list as long as mine to pick out the best works, but here are some of the things I really enjoyed this year:
Mercy Thompson series by Patricia Briggs (urban fantasy)
Psycop series by Jordan Castillo Price (gay detective/paranormal)
Serge Storms series by Tim Dorsey (zany Florida crime)
Yellow Blue Tibia & New Model Army by Adam Roberts (science fiction)
Luck In the Shadows & Stalking Darkness by Lynn Flewelling (fantasy)
Virgil Flowers series by John Sandford (mystery)
The Stranger by Max Frei (fantasy)
Dixie Swim Club & Marvin's Room (scripts)
I read a lot more this year than I have in any year since I began keeping records. This is partly because I bought an ebook reader this year, which makes reading more convenient, and gives me much faster access to books. I used to drive to the bookstore and hope they had what I wanted, or order books online and wait up to a week and a half for them to arrive. Now I pick something out and can be reading it five minutes later. Much faster access to books means I read more. But I was on a fast pace for the year even before I bought the ebook reader: I read 72 books in the three and a half months before I bought my Nook. The Nook just made it even easier to keep up that pace.
In 2010 I read a whole lot of gay fiction: gay romance, gay mystery, gay paranormal, gay horror. Many of these were shorter than an average science fiction or mystery novel, so they went fast and helped get the count up. I also dove into the depths of urban fantasy and paranormals, with mixed results. I have concluded that I really do like some of the genre, if it's the right type, but most of it isn't the right type. The average UF, to me, tends to be somewhere between bad and so-so, but those rare gems are really great. I'm glad I decided to explore, or I never would have discovered the awesome Mercy Thompson novels by Patricia Briggs. I also brushed the surface of heterosexual paranormal romance, but my sampling has been disheartening.
So, on to the numbers:
I finished 253 books and scripts this year.
11 were regular science fiction
27 were crime or mysteries
45 were fantasy or urban fantasy
10 were scripts
139 were gay fiction of some sort
The remainder were general fiction, nonfiction, or hetero romance
It's hard to pare down a list as long as mine to pick out the best works, but here are some of the things I really enjoyed this year:
Mercy Thompson series by Patricia Briggs (urban fantasy)
Psycop series by Jordan Castillo Price (gay detective/paranormal)
Serge Storms series by Tim Dorsey (zany Florida crime)
Yellow Blue Tibia & New Model Army by Adam Roberts (science fiction)
Luck In the Shadows & Stalking Darkness by Lynn Flewelling (fantasy)
Virgil Flowers series by John Sandford (mystery)
The Stranger by Max Frei (fantasy)
Dixie Swim Club & Marvin's Room (scripts)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)