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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Mordor: twinned with Slough
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
I tried reading one of hers and couldn't get into it, which is odd because it's the type of thing that I would normally like. I think the problem was... detachment (the author's, or mine, or a bit of both). The characters seemed slightly lifeless and I found myself completely uninterested in what happened to them.
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
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I would be interested to know who [the Gunpowder Plotters] might have expected to take the throne after the disaster. A Catholic?
...
According to Wikipedia, James's young daughter Elizabeth would be installed as a puppet Queen, and brought up as a Catholic & married to one. This is slightly ironic, given that in fact in later life, as the 'Winter Queen' of Bohemia, she became bit of a Protestant pin-up girl.
[ 24. September 2014, 10:53: Message edited by: Albertus ]
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My beard is a testament to my masculinity and virility, and demonstrates that I am a real man. Trouble is, bits of quiche sometimes get caught in it.
Posts: 6498 | From: Y Sowth | Registered: Jan 2008
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georgiaboy
Shipmate
# 11294
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Posted
I've only recently discovered Sarah Caudwell's work. Here in the US, I've found 'Thus Was Adonis Murdered' (1981), 'The Shortest Way to Hades' (1984) and 'The Sirens Sang of Murder' (1989).
Lots of fun detail about the legal profession in London, incidentals of life of an Oxford prof, and excellently crafted plot and dialogue.
Don't know if there are later entries to her list, but I highly recommend these.
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You can't retire from a calling.
Posts: 1675 | From: saint meinrad, IN | Registered: Apr 2006
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Ariel
Shipmate
# 58
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
I tried reading one of hers and couldn't get into it, which is odd because it's the type of thing that I would normally like. I think the problem was... detachment (the author's, or mine, or a bit of both). The characters seemed slightly lifeless and I found myself completely uninterested in what happened to them.
Yes, it was the sort of thing I'd normally enjoy as well. I think "slightly lifeless" and "detached" are about right. With some novels you can get absorbed in them as the story plays out in front of you; with these I tended to be conscious that I was reading a work of fiction.
Posts: 25445 | Registered: May 2001
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
Could have been worse. Could have been 'The Affinity Engine' by George Mann. Reading THAT was like listening to Les Dawson playing the piano...
...with the caveat that Les Dawson was obviously a brilliant pianist deliberately playing badly, whereas George Mann's writing style is presumably like that *all the time*.
(For non-UK readers: Les Dawson playing the piano )
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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Melangell
Shipmate
# 4023
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by georgiaboy:
I've only recently discovered Sarah Caudwell's work. Here in the US, I've found 'Thus Was Adonis Murdered' (1981), 'The Shortest Way to Hades' (1984) and 'The Sirens Sang of Murder' (1989).
Lots of fun detail about the legal profession in London, incidentals of life of an Oxford prof, and excellently crafted plot and dialogue.
Don't know if there are later entries to her list, but I highly recommend these.
I believe the fourth and final title is The sibyl in her grave (2000). The author died in February of that year. The crime writer Martin Edwards has an article about her here . I agree that it's a very enjoyable series…
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Gwnewch y pethau bychein (Dewi Sant)
Do the little things (Saint David)
Posts: 367 | From: A bit of Wales in Surrey | Registered: Jan 2003
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jedijudy
Organist of the Jedi Temple
# 333
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Posted
[tangent] Hi Melangell! ![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif) [/tangent]
Recently the Book Group read one of Laurie R. King's books from her Mary Russell series. Recently I found one of her Kate Martinelli mysteries in a used book store. How could I lose?
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
This book, "with child" totally sucked me in. King writes intelligently (IMHO) and descriptively. "with child" is the third in the series, so now it's time to hunt the first two and any others King may have written since! Very different from the Mary Russell stories, but just as hard to put down. The library is across the street from my work, which is a Very Good Thing!
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Jasmine, little cat with a big heart.
Posts: 18017 | From: 'Twixt the 'Glades and the Gulf | Registered: Aug 2001
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Melangell
Shipmate
# 4023
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by jedijudy:
[tangent] Hi Melangell! [/tangent]
Recently the Book Group read one of Laurie R. King's books from her Mary Russell series. Recently I found one of her Kate Martinelli mysteries in a used book store. How could I lose?
[tangent] Hello jedijudy! [/tangent]
I enjoy both the Mary Russell and the Kate Martinelli series - there are currently five of the latter. No. 5, The Art of Detection, appears to bridge both series…(!)
A good source for finding out what my favourite authors have written is Fantastic Fiction which is where I've just checked out the KM series. Lots to enjoy!
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Gwnewch y pethau bychein (Dewi Sant)
Do the little things (Saint David)
Posts: 367 | From: A bit of Wales in Surrey | Registered: Jan 2003
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balaam
Making an ass of myself
# 4543
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by LeRoc:
I'm reading Frankenstein right now, and I have to say I'm pleasantly surprised by it. ... It seems that there different kinds of ethics at play here.
The point being is that the real monster is not the creature but the doctor who created it.
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Last ever sig ...
blog
Posts: 9049 | From: Hen Ogledd | Registered: May 2003
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Jack the Lass
Ship's airhead
# 3415
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Posted
My most recent 3 books have all been by journalists (this was by accident not design), which meant that they have all been well-written, easy reads with a good eye/ear for a pithy phrase.
First up was "Eat, Pray, Eat" by Michael Booth - he's a food writer who goes with his family for an extended trip round India, ostensibly to research for a book on Indian food, but the subtext is to salvage his marriage and family life which have been suffering primarily from his drinking, lack of attention and general mid-life crisis. Midway through the trip his wife announces that she has enrolled him in a 5 week yoga bootcamp in Mysore, and that if he doesn't sort himself out she is leaving. It took me a while to get into, I think that the way he set it up was to make it really clear that he was a bit of a selfish prick who needed to sort himself out, so although it was self-deprecating (and often quite funny, usually at his expense), I found it quite hard to get beyond thinking "you're a bit of a selfish prick". I found I had a ton more sympathy for him once he started the yoga bootcamp, both in terms of his own insights about himself but also because of his descriptions of the realities of an overweight, middle-aged, unfit, cynical person trying to do this pretty hardcore yoga (he talked for example about feeling humiliated lying on the floor to recover while all around the other participants were contorting themselves into all sorts of unlikely positions; I could *so* relate to that from my one (and probably only) humiliating foray into yoga a few years ago. I enjoyed this, eventually, and will keep an eye out for more of his books in the library.
Second up, last week I finished Ron McMillan's "Between Weathers: Travels Round 21st Century Shetland". This was a wonderful book. I had been to Shetland for a couple of days a few years ago and always wanted to go back, and this just fed into that, it was a brilliant evocation of a wonderful place. He is just one of those wonderful travellers who travels without (much of) an itinerary, preferring to just see where the fancy takes him and who he meets, and he was very generous in his writing without romanticising the place. Thoroughly recommended.
And now I'm reading "The Potting-Shed Papers: On Gardening, Gardeners and Garden History" by Charles Elliott, which is a series of essays originally appearing as his column in the American magazine Horticulture. Although American he lives in London and has a garden in south Wales, so writes as both an insider and outsider on the peculiarities of gardening in Britain. None of the essays are longer than 5 or 6 pages, so it's a great book for dipping into, but I am really enjoying it.
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"My body is a temple - it's big and doesn't move." (Jo Brand)
wiblog blipfoto blog
Posts: 5767 | From: the land of the deep-fried Mars Bar | Registered: Oct 2002
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QLib
Bad Example
# 43
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Posted
I think someone on board recommended A Conspiracy of Paper by David Liss, but I can't find the post in question ... well, if it wasn't a shipmate, I don't know who it was, but I'm very grateful. It's a substantial treat - I'm halfway through at the moment and dragging it out a bit because I don't want it to end.
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Tradition is the handing down of the flame, not the worship of the ashes Gustav Mahler.
Posts: 8913 | From: Page 28 | Registered: May 2001
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Wood
The Milkman of Human Kindness
# 7
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Posted
I just finished reading a fascinating poetry collection called Dance Dance Revolution by Cathy Park Hong, set in a near-future fake American city-cum museum. Funny and sad, and very, very odd.
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Narcissism.
Posts: 7842 | From: Wood Towers | Registered: Apr 2001
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deano
princess
# 12063
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Posted
I've just read The Lord of the Rings. I thought this thread was about that. Sorry.
Well I say read, I've read the first third of the book a few times and just got bored with it. I've been trying to get through the damned thing since I was 16. I made it this time at the age of 47!
Was it worth it? On balance yes. I think the pacing is off and had to persevere a few times when the same characters were walking across the same country for days on end, and I did skip over almost all the poetry and songs. But it was enjoyable at the end.
Anyway, sorry for the diversion.
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"The moral high ground is slowly being bombed to oblivion. " - Supermatelot
Posts: 2118 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: Nov 2006
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Sandemaniac
Shipmate
# 12829
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by balaam:
The point being is that the real monster is not the creature but the doctor who created it.
Oh yes, very much so! The monster becomes monstrous because of what happens to it, but as balaam says...
AG
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"It becomes soon pleasantly apparent that change-ringing is by no means merely an excuse for beer" Charles Dickens gets it wrong, 1869
Posts: 3574 | From: The wardrobe of my soul | Registered: Jul 2007
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Moo
Ship's tough old bird
# 107
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Posted
I am currently reading what if?; serious scientific answers to absurd hypothetical questions*. It's by Randall Munroe, the creator of xkcd.
Here is one of the questions and an excerpt from the answer** quote:
What if a glass of water was, all of a sudden, literally half empty?
.......
But what if the empty half of the glass were actually empty--a vacuum? The vacuum would definitely not last long But exactly what happens depends on a key question that nobody usually bothers to ask: Which half is empty?
Moo
*Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Boston 2014
**p.119-120
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Kerygmania host
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See you later, alligator.
Posts: 20365 | From: Alleghany Mountains of Virginia | Registered: May 2001
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agingjb
Shipmate
# 16555
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Posted
I'm reading "Impressions of Theophrastus Such" by George Eliot.
A confession, I'd never heard of this book, her last, until I came across a mention in an essay by Geoffrey Hill.
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Refraction Villanelles
Posts: 464 | From: Southern England | Registered: Jul 2011
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The Weeder
Shipmate
# 11321
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gill H:
quote:
Originally posted by ChastMastr:
I've started re-reading Screwtape Letters!
Ever heard the John Cleese audiobook? Perfect casting. He reads it superbly.
I pulled my Screwtape off the shelves this morning, to re-read. I read it every couple of years or so- it never fails to amuse me.
I am also re-reading the Father Brown stories. GK Chestertons stories about this little Catholic priest never fail to hit the spot.
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Still missing the gator
Posts: 2542 | From: LaLa Land | Registered: Apr 2006
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TurquoiseTastic
Fish of a different color
# 8978
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Posted
I am currently attacking "North and South" for the first time. My goodness. I had completely the wrong idea of Mrs. Gaskell previously - I thought she was a sort of sub-Austen-type writer. More like Eliot with a touch of "Dickens on an aggressive day"!
Posts: 1092 | From: Hants., UK | Registered: Jan 2005
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la vie en rouge
Parisienne
# 10688
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Posted
I am eternally grateful to the person who passed along Louis de Bernières’s Notwithstanding. It’s a collection of interconnected short stories describing life in an English village. It’s filled with fabulous characters and surprisingly unsentimental. I loved it and am very bummed that's it's finished already.
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Rent my holiday home in the South of France
Posts: 3696 | Registered: Nov 2005
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Ariel
Shipmate
# 58
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Posted
Just finished reading "Citadel" by Kate Mosse, the third book in her "Labyrinth" trilogy. This one is set in the same part of southern France as the others, but during the Second World War.
It's an odd book. There's less of the timeslip element than in her previous two, so when she does plunge back into the fourth century, it comes almost as an irrelevance and an anomaly. The story of the Resistance fighters is much more interesting and the conclusion not what I had expected.
I was interested to see the author had written this book three times; perhaps that's the secret because it came across as more polished than the preceding two. I'm half minded to get a copy of this as I think this is one that I'll want to read again.
(I wonder if she will write more? When you have a 700-year-old hero like Audric Baillard, there's plenty of scope for him to be involved in adventures in other centuries...)
Posts: 25445 | Registered: May 2001
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Tree Bee
Ship's tiller girl
# 4033
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
I have just finished 'Fabulous Riches' by former pop star, now priest, Richard Coles. It's like a long personal testimony but has been vilified by conservative evangelicals who know next to nothing about the spiritual classics.
This has my detailed thoughts on it.
Looks good Leo. One for our book group?
I must be middle class as I wear Boden, have eaten Mivvis and am aware of Jennings and Buckeridge!
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"Any fool can make something complicated. It takes a genius to make it simple."
— Woody Guthrie
http://saysaysay54.wordpress.com
Posts: 5257 | From: me to you. | Registered: Feb 2003
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JoannaP
Shipmate
# 4493
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Posted
I have recently discovered Simon Parke's thrillers. I thoroughly enjoyed A Vicar, Crucified, which was clearly written by somebody who knows how the CofE works (or doesn't!). My only quibble concerns Abbot Peter; I don't understand why he left his monastery when he retired as abbot. Finding one of the most accurate descriptions of myself I have seen for a while in the Enneagram types in the Appendix was weird. The second one is already downloaded...
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"Freedom for the pike is death for the minnow." R. H. Tawney (quoted by Isaiah Berlin)
"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." Benjamin Franklin
Posts: 1877 | From: England | Registered: May 2003
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LeRoc
Famous Dutch pirate
# 3216
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Posted
quote:
JoannaP: I have recently discovered Simon Parke's thrillers. I thoroughly enjoyed A Vicar, Crucified
This was discussed by the Ship's book group last year.
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I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)
Posts: 9474 | From: Brazil / Africa | Registered: Aug 2002
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JoannaP
Shipmate
# 4493
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Posted
Thanks for that link; having read the discussion, I am now wondering if I am being too easily pleased...
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"Freedom for the pike is death for the minnow." R. H. Tawney (quoted by Isaiah Berlin)
"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." Benjamin Franklin
Posts: 1877 | From: England | Registered: May 2003
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Sarasa
Shipmate
# 12271
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Posted
Rather late to the party on this one
Moo said (in August):
quote:
I've just finished reading Antonia Fraser's Faith and Treason, the Story of the Gunpowder Plot. It is very well-written and interesting. I learned that Guy Fawkes role in the plot was not nearly as important as that of Robert Catesby.
I read this a while ago and really enjoyed it. Catesby was such a charasmatic person. Has anyone written a novel or made a film with him as the main character? The end where, mortally wounded, he tries to crawl towards a statue of Our Lady was very cinematic.
The main thing that remained with me from reading the book was Catesby and co escaping when the plot was rumbled, holding up in a houese and then trying to dry their damp gunpowder by a fire.
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'I guess things didn't go so well tonight, but I'm trying. Lord, I'm trying.' Charlie (Harvey Keitel) in Mean Streets.
Posts: 2035 | From: London | Registered: Jan 2007
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Tree Bee
Ship's tiller girl
# 4033
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
I think a book group could get a lot out of it, provided there weren't any who are prudish.
The ship book group would like to read it when the paperback comes out, say, next June.
How would you feel about posting some questions for us then?
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"Any fool can make something complicated. It takes a genius to make it simple."
— Woody Guthrie
http://saysaysay54.wordpress.com
Posts: 5257 | From: me to you. | Registered: Feb 2003
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JoannaP
Shipmate
# 4493
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Posted
I have discovered that, as well as the Daisy Dalrymple books, Carola Dunn has written several regency romances. They aspire to be Heyer (in a way that M. C. Beaton's don't) and it can be fun dissecting them in terms of which Heyer inspired which bit. The plots are stupendously silly - and generally seem to involve somebody pretending to be lower down the social scale than they really are - but they are easy to read and good fun.
One day, I might get out of my prolonged comfort reading rut but, in the meantime, these are less than £2 on the Kindle.
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"Freedom for the pike is death for the minnow." R. H. Tawney (quoted by Isaiah Berlin)
"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." Benjamin Franklin
Posts: 1877 | From: England | Registered: May 2003
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Huia
Shipmate
# 3473
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Posted
** Bumped** for Wodders.
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Charity gives food from the table, Justice gives a place at the table.
Posts: 10382 | From: Te Wai Pounamu | Registered: Oct 2002
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Welease Woderwick
Sister Incubus Nightmare
# 10424
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Posted
Thanks Huia.
I recently started a rather superfluous new Books thread with the following post. Now I know where this thread is the new one can be deleted.
quote:
I think the previous book thread went the way of all flesh in the last winnowing so I thought I would start another, just for the heck of it.
We went away last week and before going I stood looking at my fiction shelves trying to choose a suitable volume and settled on Le Carre's Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy - I had forgotten over the years since I last read any of his stuff what a really excellent write the guy is - excellent stuff. Now I have remade his acquaintance I may try more later.
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I give thanks for unknown blessings already on their way.
Fancy a break in South India?
Accessible Homestay Guesthouse in Central Kerala, contact me for details
What part of Matt. 7:1 don't you understand?
Posts: 48139 | From: 1st on the right, straight on 'til morning | Registered: Sep 2005
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
I'm a great Le Carré fan, although I find reading too much in one go leads to a sense of desperation setting in (you also notice how he plagiarises himself from time to time). A Perfect Spy is my favourite of his.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
Posts: 17944 | From: 528491 | Registered: Jul 2002
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ElaineC
Shipmate
# 12244
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by JoannaP:
I have discovered that, as well as the Daisy Dalrymple books, Carola Dunn has written several regency romances. They aspire to be Heyer (in a way that M. C. Beaton's don't) and it can be fun dissecting them in terms of which Heyer inspired which bit. The plots are stupendously silly - and generally seem to involve somebody pretending to be lower down the social scale than they really are - but they are easy to read and good fun.
One day, I might get out of my prolonged comfort reading rut but, in the meantime, these are less than £2 on the Kindle.
I discovered Daisy recently too. I read an omnibus edition of four books on my Kindle. I loved them. I do like a nice easy read!
As usual I have two books on the go at once. One I read on my Kindle on the way to and from work and at the moment it's Time's Echo by Pamela Hartshorne set both in the present and York in 1577. It's compelling reading as two lives are drawn together. A Kindle recommendation.
My other one is The Food of Love Cookery School by Nicky Pellegrino it's set in Sicily and again is a very easy read I bought in the airport departure lounge.
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Music is the only language in which you cannot say a mean or sarcastic thing. John Erskine
Posts: 464 | From: Orpington, Kent, UK | Registered: Jan 2007
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Sir Kevin
Ship's Gaffer
# 3492
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink:
On the other had, An Instance of the Fingerpost is possibly one of the best mysterys I have read
I found it to be the worst mystery I had ever read!
I got it from the library, but it was so rough going that, try as I may, I could not get through it. I abandoned it about mid-way through...
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If you board the wrong train, it is no use running along the corridor in the other direction Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Writing is currently my hobby, not yet my profession.
Posts: 30517 | From: White Hart Lane | Registered: Oct 2002
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Adeodatus
Shipmate
# 4992
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Posted
I've just finished Frankenstein, which I'd never read before. My goodness, what a story! There are a couple of bits that don't make much sense, or seem to have been included because they introduce the exotic or the picturesque (I suspect Mary might have been giving in to some unwanted advice from Byron and Shelley), but overall it's phenomenal. Both the Creature and Frankenstein have real moral authority, even though they're utterly opposed, and the final scene (in the ship) is simply beautiful.
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"What is broken, repair with gold."
Posts: 9779 | From: Manchester | Registered: Sep 2003
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Eigon
Shipmate
# 4917
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Posted
I've just been reading The Lamp of the Wicked, the fifth Merrily Watkins story, by Phil Rickman. This is the one with the electricity pylons and Fred West, and I enjoyed it very much. As I live in the general area, it's very easy to imagine things like Lol's come-back concert at the Courtyard in Hereford and so on.
I picked this one up thinking vaguely it might be the one before Magus of Hay, but of course it's far earlier in the series than that - so I still have to find the one in which Frannie Bliss gets the concussion he's dealing with at the beginning of Magus. (and isn't it easy to slip into thinking of the characters as real people?)
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Laugh hard. Run fast. Be kind.
Posts: 3710 | From: Hay-on-Wye, town of books | Registered: Aug 2003
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Brenda Clough
Shipmate
# 18061
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Posted
I have just finished THE KING OF INVENTORS: A Biography of Wilkie Collins by Catherine Peters. This came out in 1993.
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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page
Posts: 6378 | From: Washington DC | Registered: Mar 2014
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Motylos
Apprentice
# 18216
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Posted
Just finished Star Maker by Olaf Stapleton — one of those intriguing interwar ‘histories’ of the future, such as H. G. Wells The Shape of Things to Come, which have an overarching belief in the superiority of the rational man — which has an amazing overview of the world in the late 1930s in the last chapter. Now started Hermann Hesse’s The Glass Bead Game — I am a glutton for genre. But my default is always one of Margery Allingham’s Campion stories. I like her wordcraft and descriptions. Although I also embarked on reading Ender’s Game as I am a bit of a Sci-Fi addict too. With that in mind, has anyone else ever read any Sherri S. Tepper novels?
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“Too often we assume that the light on the wall is god, but the light is not the goal of the search, it is the result of the search.”
G’Kar, ‘Meditations on the Abyss’
Posts: 31 | From: Kernow | Registered: Sep 2014
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basso
Ship’s Crypt Keeper
# 4228
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Posted
I like Tepper. She's very feminist and environmentalist, which can wave big red flags at some readers, but it makes me like her more.
You might start with The Family Tree.
Posts: 4358 | From: Bay Area, Calif | Registered: Mar 2003
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Sir Kevin
Ship's Gaffer
# 3492
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Adeodatus:
I've just finished Frankenstein, which I'd never read before. My goodness, what a story! There are a couple of bits that don't make much sense, or seem to have been included because they introduce the exotic or the picturesque (I suspect Mary might have been giving in to some unwanted advice from Byron and Shelley), but overall it's phenomenal. Both the Creature and Frankenstein have real moral authority, even though they're utterly opposed, and the final scene (in the ship) is simply beautiful.
It was bloody fabulous when read it quite a few years ago and I also read and saw Nosferatu.
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If you board the wrong train, it is no use running along the corridor in the other direction Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Writing is currently my hobby, not yet my profession.
Posts: 30517 | From: White Hart Lane | Registered: Oct 2002
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jedijudy
Organist of the Jedi Temple
# 333
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Posted
A friendly, hostly comment to Brenda Clough: please use italics or quotes when providing book titles. Use of all caps comes across as shouting, and my poor nerves get in such a jumpy state when shouting is going on! ![[Biased]](wink.gif)
jedijudy
Heaven Host with sensitive ears...or is it eyes?
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Jasmine, little cat with a big heart.
Posts: 18017 | From: 'Twixt the 'Glades and the Gulf | Registered: Aug 2001
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LeRoc
Famous Dutch pirate
# 3216
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Posted
I just bought a book by Portuguese writer Afonso Cruz. It is called Jesus Cristo bebeu cerveja ("Jesus Christ drank beer"). It seems interesting. It's about a man who's always wanted to see Jerusalem and goes there with his daughter just before he dies. But I admit I bought it for the title also I'll be travelling on a boat along the Amazon River again this week, so I'll have plenty of time to read.
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I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)
Posts: 9474 | From: Brazil / Africa | Registered: Aug 2002
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Motylos
Apprentice
# 18216
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by basso:
I like Tepper. She's very feminist and environmentalist, which can wave big red flags at some readers, but it makes me like her more.
You might start with The Family Tree.
Thanks, basso, but I have read a number of her works. I find her understanding of alien minds and cultures riveting. Her own background is interesting and has justifiably influenced her feminism and environmentalism.
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“Too often we assume that the light on the wall is god, but the light is not the goal of the search, it is the result of the search.”
G’Kar, ‘Meditations on the Abyss’
Posts: 31 | From: Kernow | Registered: Sep 2014
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Welease Woderwick
Sister Incubus Nightmare
# 10424
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Posted
I've just finished The Martian by Andy Weir - I have already discussed it with a few folks elsewhere.
Yes, it is a good read BUT I thought it got a bit boring and repetitive in the third quarter.
Will I ever read it again?
Possibly but I think it'll be a while before I'm moved to do so.
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I give thanks for unknown blessings already on their way.
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What part of Matt. 7:1 don't you understand?
Posts: 48139 | From: 1st on the right, straight on 'til morning | Registered: Sep 2005
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QLib
Bad Example
# 43
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Posted
I've just finished Ruth Ozeki's A Tale for the Time Being which I think I prefer to The Luminaries which beat it to the Booker prize in 2013. Well, I like them both, but I could do without all the astrological crap in the latter, whereas the Zen element in Ozeki's tale is much more my cup of tea.
I'm another huge fan of An Instance of the Finger Post - it deals so brilliantly with the post-modernist agenda.
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Tradition is the handing down of the flame, not the worship of the ashes Gustav Mahler.
Posts: 8913 | From: Page 28 | Registered: May 2001
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Brenda Clough
Shipmate
# 18061
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Posted
I loved Fingerpost. I found a thick trade-paper edition abandoned at a beach resort in Antigua, and instantly adopted it. Kept me happy on the flight home and for days after.
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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page
Posts: 6378 | From: Washington DC | Registered: Mar 2014
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Eigon
Shipmate
# 4917
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Posted
Whenever I see a Daphne du Maurier I haven't read before I pick it up, so I've just whizzed through The Flight of the Falcon, set in an Italian university town a little while after the Second World War, and involving two brothers separated during the last days of the war, while comparing and contrasting with Duke Claudio the Falcon and his brother during the Renaissance. So the ending becomes inevitable as the two stories parallel each other - but I read du Maurier for the atmosphere as much as anything, so I thoroughly enjoyed being immersed in that world.
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Laugh hard. Run fast. Be kind.
Posts: 3710 | From: Hay-on-Wye, town of books | Registered: Aug 2003
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