Lots of reading
Jul. 24th, 2003 03:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
altarielI haven't listed what I've been reading in ages, a couple of months now. OK, here we go.
Connie Willis, To Say Nothing of the Dog--Time Travel--High Jinks on the Thames--Victoriana--Nods and Winks to DLS fans--sagged a little in the middle but I loved it.
Gregory Maguire, Lost. I adored his first book Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West. This is a much sparer book, not as well-written, but I like ghost stories, and I found the prickly heroine's story and the exorcism of what was haunting her very touching. (![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
katlinel, one for the pile?)
Twelfth Night. The only thing I like about this play is Feste.
Gita Mehta, Raj. This book is absolutely raved about in all the reviews I've read. It's the story of an Indian princess growing up during all the major events of the 20th century, and I have to say that it's really badly written. The lead character is a complete cipher, hardly uttering a word throughout and, at one point - I kid you not - she scores the winning goal in a polo match in front of Edward VIII. Honestly. And yet I absolutely devoured it, because the historical and cultural information was so fascinating. A review on the front (OK, it was The Daily Mail) says it was 'easily the year's best novel' and you really have to wonder what other novels were published in 1989, because as a novel it's crap. But it's still a very absorbing read.
Michael Stanton, Hobbits, Elves and Wizards is a collection of Stanton's lecture notes turned into brief essays. It didn't say anything I didn't already know, but it was a quick and enjoyable read, and I would have adored it when I was thirteen. So I'm glad it's on my shelf for any thirteen-year-old Tolkien devotee who may one day be in my house.
Diana Wynne Jones, Deep Secret. We are not worthy. It's that simple.
J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. I do my bit for the world's trees by not providing a link to Amazon. I enjoyed it. The start was slow, I liked the Orwellian overtones and more snippets from the previous generation, thought Umbridge was a great villain, and the scene with Dumbledore at the end was preposterous. So I liked the usual things, disliked the usual things, and thought it was streets ahead of Goblet of Fire.
E.B. White, Charlotte's Web. No, I've never read it before. I thought it was great.
Jill Paton Walsh and Dorothy L. Sayers, A Presumption of Death. The connection of this to any of DLS's actual work is pretty tenuous (it's based on The Wimsey Papers, which were a series of wartime letters between members of the Wimsey family published as a morale raiser in the Spectator in 1939 and 1940). Stylistically, too, it's nothing like Sayers, but I thought the characterization was very good, and I found the evocation of wartime England very touching. And I wanted there to be more when I finished reading, which is surely a good sign.
Charles Frazier, Cold Mountain. I tell you, this book was this close to being my favourite book of the year. It's a retelling of the Odyssey, set in North Carolina at the very end of the American Civil War, and it alternates between the perspectives of Inman, a Confederate soldier who has deserted, and Ada, his sweetheart to whom he is trying to return. The prose is just gorgeous, and the sense of melancholy and yearning at the start of the book made me ache so much I had to put the book aside for a couple of weeks. I picked up it up again and raced through it, loving it... and then - ten minutes to go - and he starts putting some bloody plot in! I couldn't believe it! I haven't been this cross about the end of something since I saw Vanilla Sky. Oh, Minghella's making it into a film with Jude Law.
Barbara Kingsolver, Prodigal Summer.merrymaia thank you so much for recommending this wonderful, marvellous book, which had me crying for joy twice this morning! katlinel, I suspect this is an INFJ book, and I've added it to the pile.
That's your lot.
Connie Willis, To Say Nothing of the Dog--Time Travel--High Jinks on the Thames--Victoriana--Nods and Winks to DLS fans--sagged a little in the middle but I loved it.
Gregory Maguire, Lost. I adored his first book Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West. This is a much sparer book, not as well-written, but I like ghost stories, and I found the prickly heroine's story and the exorcism of what was haunting her very touching. (
katlinel, one for the pile?)Twelfth Night. The only thing I like about this play is Feste.
Gita Mehta, Raj. This book is absolutely raved about in all the reviews I've read. It's the story of an Indian princess growing up during all the major events of the 20th century, and I have to say that it's really badly written. The lead character is a complete cipher, hardly uttering a word throughout and, at one point - I kid you not - she scores the winning goal in a polo match in front of Edward VIII. Honestly. And yet I absolutely devoured it, because the historical and cultural information was so fascinating. A review on the front (OK, it was The Daily Mail) says it was 'easily the year's best novel' and you really have to wonder what other novels were published in 1989, because as a novel it's crap. But it's still a very absorbing read.
Michael Stanton, Hobbits, Elves and Wizards is a collection of Stanton's lecture notes turned into brief essays. It didn't say anything I didn't already know, but it was a quick and enjoyable read, and I would have adored it when I was thirteen. So I'm glad it's on my shelf for any thirteen-year-old Tolkien devotee who may one day be in my house.
Diana Wynne Jones, Deep Secret. We are not worthy. It's that simple.
J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. I do my bit for the world's trees by not providing a link to Amazon. I enjoyed it. The start was slow, I liked the Orwellian overtones and more snippets from the previous generation, thought Umbridge was a great villain, and the scene with Dumbledore at the end was preposterous. So I liked the usual things, disliked the usual things, and thought it was streets ahead of Goblet of Fire.
E.B. White, Charlotte's Web. No, I've never read it before. I thought it was great.
Jill Paton Walsh and Dorothy L. Sayers, A Presumption of Death. The connection of this to any of DLS's actual work is pretty tenuous (it's based on The Wimsey Papers, which were a series of wartime letters between members of the Wimsey family published as a morale raiser in the Spectator in 1939 and 1940). Stylistically, too, it's nothing like Sayers, but I thought the characterization was very good, and I found the evocation of wartime England very touching. And I wanted there to be more when I finished reading, which is surely a good sign.
Charles Frazier, Cold Mountain. I tell you, this book was this close to being my favourite book of the year. It's a retelling of the Odyssey, set in North Carolina at the very end of the American Civil War, and it alternates between the perspectives of Inman, a Confederate soldier who has deserted, and Ada, his sweetheart to whom he is trying to return. The prose is just gorgeous, and the sense of melancholy and yearning at the start of the book made me ache so much I had to put the book aside for a couple of weeks. I picked up it up again and raced through it, loving it... and then - ten minutes to go - and he starts putting some bloody plot in! I couldn't believe it! I haven't been this cross about the end of something since I saw Vanilla Sky. Oh, Minghella's making it into a film with Jude Law.
Barbara Kingsolver, Prodigal Summer.
merrymaia thank you so much for recommending this wonderful, marvellous book, which had me crying for joy twice this morning! katlinel, I suspect this is an INFJ book, and I've added it to the pile. That's your lot.
