Of books and... well, mostly just books
At work, trying to eat lunch while simultaneously typing this without getting food all over the keyboard, but I have to do a books update before I start forgetting what I've read, so:
- The Cursed Child! [Spoiler (click to open)]Scorpius is adorable, and his bromance with Albus is just ridiculous. <3 How are they not a couple by the end? Time travel is the best, and I loved all the timey-wimey stuff. Then Snape appeared and I kind of lost it and read through the rest through a haze of snot-nosed nostalgia. I don't think I'm going to write a detailed review of it, but I'm happy to talk about it if anyone wants to!
- Yesterday, I spent the whole evening reading: rare and so so enjoyable. I finished Breathing in Colour, a book about a British woman (Alida) who comes to India in search of her lost teenaged daughter (Mia). The reason I bought the book years ago (apart from the fact that it was on sale at a huge discount) was that the daughter is a synaesthete, and I've been interested in synaesthesia ever since I discovered Keats. Parts of it are a bit strange. The author clearly knows a lot about the tourist spots in India, but the descriptions play up the 'exotic' element a little too much, and sometimes the trauma Alida is feeling -- because of not just Mia but also a past tragedy, which is revealed to us in bits and pieces -- is just badly written. But the descriptions of Mia's experiences as her senses merge into each other are pretty decent. [Spoiler (click to open)]Mia's younger sister Kizzy drowns in the bathtub as a baby, and we're left wondering until the end of the book if Mia, who'd been terribly jealous of the new baby, was responsible for Kizzy's death.
- After 'Breathing,' I started and finished 84, Charing Cross Road. Which completely broke my heart. It won't take you more than a couple of hours to read, and it's so worth it. Is there anything better than a book about books? Answer: it's a book that has letters about books written to each other by real people over the course of multiple decades. The wonderfully rude Helene Hanff is an American writer who orders books from Marks & Co, a British bookshop, and corresponds with many of its employees and their extended families, most notably Frank Doel, the chief buyer. I was left wondering what happened to some of the people the others lost touch with; will have to read the next book, in which Hanff describes what happened when she finally got to visit England. For those interested, here are Goodreads' lists of Books about Books and Books about Bookstores.
- Re The Book Thief, which I mentioned last time that I was loving, I watched the film after finishing the book. Both are gorgeous, but they're also relentlessly tragic.
- Now reading: Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet, which is a quietly beautiful book about the friendship between a Chinese-American boy and a Japanese-American girl during the 1940s, at a time when people of Japanese origin are being forcibly sent to internment camps. The story begins in the present time from Henry's point of view, and I guess I'll find out soon enough what happened to Keiko in the past. Fingers crossed.
- I've read a couple of lovely Femme Remix fics, so, in the spirit of enjoying fannish things and passing on the joy, here's a rec: Behind Layers, Minerva McGonagall/Poppy Pomfrey. There are a couple more but I'm out of time now, so I'll save them for next time.
LLAP. ♥
- The Cursed Child! [Spoiler (click to open)]Scorpius is adorable, and his bromance with Albus is just ridiculous. <3 How are they not a couple by the end? Time travel is the best, and I loved all the timey-wimey stuff. Then Snape appeared and I kind of lost it and read through the rest through a haze of snot-nosed nostalgia. I don't think I'm going to write a detailed review of it, but I'm happy to talk about it if anyone wants to!
- Yesterday, I spent the whole evening reading: rare and so so enjoyable. I finished Breathing in Colour, a book about a British woman (Alida) who comes to India in search of her lost teenaged daughter (Mia). The reason I bought the book years ago (apart from the fact that it was on sale at a huge discount) was that the daughter is a synaesthete, and I've been interested in synaesthesia ever since I discovered Keats. Parts of it are a bit strange. The author clearly knows a lot about the tourist spots in India, but the descriptions play up the 'exotic' element a little too much, and sometimes the trauma Alida is feeling -- because of not just Mia but also a past tragedy, which is revealed to us in bits and pieces -- is just badly written. But the descriptions of Mia's experiences as her senses merge into each other are pretty decent. [Spoiler (click to open)]Mia's younger sister Kizzy drowns in the bathtub as a baby, and we're left wondering until the end of the book if Mia, who'd been terribly jealous of the new baby, was responsible for Kizzy's death.
- After 'Breathing,' I started and finished 84, Charing Cross Road. Which completely broke my heart. It won't take you more than a couple of hours to read, and it's so worth it. Is there anything better than a book about books? Answer: it's a book that has letters about books written to each other by real people over the course of multiple decades. The wonderfully rude Helene Hanff is an American writer who orders books from Marks & Co, a British bookshop, and corresponds with many of its employees and their extended families, most notably Frank Doel, the chief buyer. I was left wondering what happened to some of the people the others lost touch with; will have to read the next book, in which Hanff describes what happened when she finally got to visit England. For those interested, here are Goodreads' lists of Books about Books and Books about Bookstores.
- Re The Book Thief, which I mentioned last time that I was loving, I watched the film after finishing the book. Both are gorgeous, but they're also relentlessly tragic.
- Now reading: Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet, which is a quietly beautiful book about the friendship between a Chinese-American boy and a Japanese-American girl during the 1940s, at a time when people of Japanese origin are being forcibly sent to internment camps. The story begins in the present time from Henry's point of view, and I guess I'll find out soon enough what happened to Keiko in the past. Fingers crossed.
- I've read a couple of lovely Femme Remix fics, so, in the spirit of enjoying fannish things and passing on the joy, here's a rec: Behind Layers, Minerva McGonagall/Poppy Pomfrey. There are a couple more but I'm out of time now, so I'll save them for next time.
LLAP. ♥