Books of October

[oneiriad]

Books

Rasmus Berggren & Michael Vogt: Fall of Gods - She is gone
The story isn't particularly surprising - not even the twist. The worldbuilding is decent, but not particularly revolutionary either. No, this book is carried by the art and the art is lovely.

Gail Carriger: Waistcoats & Weaponry
I must admit that I found this trilogy far less entertaining than The Parasol Protectorate - partly because it feels occasionally repetitive. I mean, it's nice to get some of the background of some of the character, but... I dunno. (And apparently it wasn't a trilogy. I could have sworn...)

Rodolph Geraci: Prinsen og jeg

Ulrik Langen: Tyven: den utrolige historie om manden, der stjal guldhornene

Litteraturens udvidede felt 2: #dette er ikke en bog
I freely admit, I read this for the article on fanfic. I was pleasantly surprised to find an article on fanfic in Danish that wasn't all about how fanfic is for teenagers. It didn't really have anything new to say to someone who has already read the books it listed as sources, but still - it was nice. (Also, sms literature is really a big deal these days, apparently?)

Naomi Mithison: The Corn King and the Spring Queen
This took some time for me to read my way into, so to speak - the first chapter is set in Marob, a tiny town on the coast of Black Sea, where our main character, Erif Der, is witch and Spring Queen, and married to the Corn King Tarrik, who her father wants her to kill, and there's machinations and stuff and honestly not that engaging. Then people start travelling to Greece, to Sparta mostly, and we meet Phyllida, a young Spartan woman who is part of a great revolution to restore the military camp glory of Sparta's ancient days, and things started to look up, and I even found myself liking Erif Der and Tarrik, who weren't particularly likable in the early bits. And there's elaborately described fertility rites (ie. orgies) and poly relationships (I ship Kleomenes/Panteus/Agiatis/Phyllida all the way) and magic and the most adorable Greek atheist philosopher and playwright, Hyperides, who has the bad luck of coming face-to-face with incontrovertible magic in Marob. Also, once we got to the parts set in Greece and later on Ptolemaic Egypt, I found myself wondering how much connection (and in which direction) there might be between Mitchison and Mary Renault. Anyway, it's a slow start and a very long read, but I think this gets to be my third favourite of the NM books I've read so far (Memoirs of a Space Woman and Travel Light are the top two, though which is which...) (but I am still not offering it for yuletide, I doubt I'd be able to write stuff - or maybe I should, and put in a hold for it at work to at least have it and maybe dare it? Maybe I'll wait and see if the letter (hopefully there'll be a letter) contains anything that might feel like I could do it. At least, the historical fantasy and magic bits were cool. We'll see.

Mænd om mænd: medaljens anden side

Naomi Novik: Uprooted

De sidste kærester på Månen
Several good stories in this one. I think my favourite has to be A. Silvestri's Ukrudt, which is a pretty dark story about how the colonization/terraforming of a pretty hostile world involves people dying a lot. Also, Majbrit Høyrup's Dommedagsdrømmere, which has me wondering if it qualifies as cozy catastrophe, and Jon Terje Østberg's Bunker blues. Apparently I was in a post-apocalyptic mood reading this anthology.

Charles Stross: The Rhesus Chart


Comics

Ed Brubaker: Fatale: West of Hell
I quite liked the medieval one - well, apart from the inevitable end...

Guy Delisle: Pyongyang
Well, that was depressing...

Neil Gaiman: Sandman: Overture

Robert Kirkman: Outcast: A Darkness Surrounds Him

Eric Knipper: Godfred Vejdekonge
I think I might have liked this better if I didn't find the art downright ugly.

Jill Thompson: The Dead Boy Detectives

Yana Toboso: Black Butler 8.

Mark Waid: Daredevil 2.


Total number of books and comics read this month: 18
Currently reading: Shadow of Night by Deborah Harkness

Total number of books and comics read this year: 154

Comments

[luzula]

Thoughts on Uprooted?

[oneiriad]

I must admit, I'm not half as excited about it as I've noticed some people being. Don't get me wrong, I liked it, it's an enjoyable read - I just suspect I've read far too many works by Tamora Pierce and the like. Of course our heroine turns out to have special magic, of course she'll find her way into solving the terrible problem that is the Wood. It's a good book, the worldbuilding is fine - but it feels a lot less new than, say, Temeraire did when I read that the first time, if you know what I mean?

[luzula]

Oops, I asked you this and then forgot about it. I think I am a bit more enthusiastic than you? Partly because it was fun and very page-turney, and partly because it hits a narrative kink of mine having to do with the relationship between humans and nature (once I figured out where the resolution was going, I was all YESSS). I would've been less enthusiastic if the Wood stayed evil the whole time.

[oneiriad]

Well, it's not that I didn't like it - it is fun and page-turney - it's just - nothing really new? Which admittedly not every book can be, but the way people were going on about it, I was kinda expecting a bit more than a perfectly fine retelling of the narrative: girl turns out to have special magic, girl ends up saving the kingdom by taking a third option.

[luzula]

Yeah, I talked with someone else who also had the reaction "I've read too much before that was too similar to this". I guess it depends on what you've read before (and what you've grown up reading). And then I also talked to people who loved it just because it belonged to their well-beloved genre.