What Am I Reading Wednesday: March 8
And after a short hiatus, I am back.
What I Just Finished Reading
Nothing. Eheheh.
What I Am Currently Reading
Journey Into Mystery: The Complete Collection vol. 1 - Kieron Gillen et al.
I'm one third of the way through the issues collected in this volume and still very much enjoying the ride.
The Light and Shadow Tarot - Brian Williams & Michael Goepferd
Read the fours and threes this week.
Followed By Frost - Charlie Holmberg
I very much enjoyed The Paper Magician, and have been waiting for this volume to go on sale to see if Holmberg's follow on effort was as delightfully imaginative as the earlier novel. One chapter in, the gender politics are retrograde (read: horrific) but the worldbuilding has promise.
The Lies of Locke Lamora - Scott Lynch
Our hero has reached adulthood and is planning out some heists of his own. The adjective onslaught continues unabated.
The Beautiful Country and the Middle Kingdom - John Pomfret
This week's chapters covered the end of the Qing dynasty and the lead-up to World War I. Pomfret's clear and engaging prose continues to shine. In fact, it's such a pleasure to read it's easy to overlook how much of a Sinophile he is. To wit: these chapters are a litany of countries-Japan, Britain, the US-jockeying for influence and hegemony. But Pomfret's narrative begs the question: influence and hegemony over whom, to say nothing of how the conditions were created that enabled this state of affairs. Indeed, the Chinese are consistently absent from this narrative; it's as if the foreign powers whose machinations Pomfret discusses were acting in a vacuum.
Zen Flesh, Zen Bones - Paul Reps & Nyogen Senzaki
While Zen Flesh, Zen Bones may have qualified as scholarship in the mid-20th century, it would not do so today. Reps and Senzaki present their material without explication, either modern or traditional. It is the book's strength, and also its weakness.
Inda - Sherwood Smith
I had hoped part two would agree with me more than the first, but Smith continues her streak of misdirected answering. I want to know what Inda thought of life on the high seas. What challenges did he face? How did he adapt? What adventures did he have? Alas, Smith foregoes all of this to skip forward several years in time and have various characters narrate plot developments to one another, instead of actually showing them.
세상에 없는 아이 - 김미승 (Sesang-e Eomnun Ai - Kim Misung)
A husband brings his starving, pregnant wife a gift of whale meat he's received from a palace official. She subsequently gives birth to a massively strong girl with an ugly face like a whale's. The girl is currently being bullied by her father and the townspeople, and is about to have a doubtlessly life-altering meeting with a yangban.
천수・금강경-무비스님 (Thousand Hands & Diamond Sutras - Mubi-seunim )
Still working my way through the modern Korean translation of the Sutra.
Martin & John 1 - 박희정 (Martin & John vol. 1 - Pak Hui-jeong)
Still reading through the second story of Martin and John, in which one of the titular characters is deceased, and the other is reminiscing about him with the woman he married before he died.
What I'm Reading Next
I should probably wrap some of these volumes up before adding any new ones to the list.
これで以上です。
What I Just Finished Reading
Nothing. Eheheh.
What I Am Currently Reading
Journey Into Mystery: The Complete Collection vol. 1 - Kieron Gillen et al.
I'm one third of the way through the issues collected in this volume and still very much enjoying the ride.
The Light and Shadow Tarot - Brian Williams & Michael Goepferd
Read the fours and threes this week.
Followed By Frost - Charlie Holmberg
I very much enjoyed The Paper Magician, and have been waiting for this volume to go on sale to see if Holmberg's follow on effort was as delightfully imaginative as the earlier novel. One chapter in, the gender politics are retrograde (read: horrific) but the worldbuilding has promise.
The Lies of Locke Lamora - Scott Lynch
Our hero has reached adulthood and is planning out some heists of his own. The adjective onslaught continues unabated.
The Beautiful Country and the Middle Kingdom - John Pomfret
This week's chapters covered the end of the Qing dynasty and the lead-up to World War I. Pomfret's clear and engaging prose continues to shine. In fact, it's such a pleasure to read it's easy to overlook how much of a Sinophile he is. To wit: these chapters are a litany of countries-Japan, Britain, the US-jockeying for influence and hegemony. But Pomfret's narrative begs the question: influence and hegemony over whom, to say nothing of how the conditions were created that enabled this state of affairs. Indeed, the Chinese are consistently absent from this narrative; it's as if the foreign powers whose machinations Pomfret discusses were acting in a vacuum.
Zen Flesh, Zen Bones - Paul Reps & Nyogen Senzaki
While Zen Flesh, Zen Bones may have qualified as scholarship in the mid-20th century, it would not do so today. Reps and Senzaki present their material without explication, either modern or traditional. It is the book's strength, and also its weakness.
Inda - Sherwood Smith
I had hoped part two would agree with me more than the first, but Smith continues her streak of misdirected answering. I want to know what Inda thought of life on the high seas. What challenges did he face? How did he adapt? What adventures did he have? Alas, Smith foregoes all of this to skip forward several years in time and have various characters narrate plot developments to one another, instead of actually showing them.
세상에 없는 아이 - 김미승 (Sesang-e Eomnun Ai - Kim Misung)
A husband brings his starving, pregnant wife a gift of whale meat he's received from a palace official. She subsequently gives birth to a massively strong girl with an ugly face like a whale's. The girl is currently being bullied by her father and the townspeople, and is about to have a doubtlessly life-altering meeting with a yangban.
천수・금강경-무비스님 (Thousand Hands & Diamond Sutras - Mubi-seunim )
Still working my way through the modern Korean translation of the Sutra.
Martin & John 1 - 박희정 (Martin & John vol. 1 - Pak Hui-jeong)
Still reading through the second story of Martin and John, in which one of the titular characters is deceased, and the other is reminiscing about him with the woman he married before he died.
What I'm Reading Next
I should probably wrap some of these volumes up before adding any new ones to the list.
これで以上です。