Books, elephants & not enough time
Another month it took me a while to get going in. Time is moving altogether too fast and life is altogether too busy and complicated to allow for any self reflection at the moment even if it's just about reading habits!
Too busy for reading too if the number of books I read is anything to go by... though actually it's more that the first book took forever and I was stubborn and insisted on finishing it rather than moving on when I realised I wasn't entirely enjoying it.
London Overground: A Day's Walk Around the Ginger Line - Iain Sinclair Well that slowed me down! I think on balance Iain Sinclair's style is not for me. I loved the concept of this book (walking the route of the London Overground in a day) and a lot of the anecdotes and descriptions are fascinating but he is SO pretentious and the guy he's walking with is a film maker of the performance art variety and everytime I found myself starting to get lost in it I'd be brought up short by some irritating phrase or self important pronouncement and have to stop reading. So... I probably don't recommend it I'm afraid. Though I did finish it.
Ironhand - Charlie Fletcher I really love this series, not really because of the plot or the characters (though they're pretty good) but because it completely warps the way I look at London. Every statue suddenly jumps out at me (metaphorically) and I notice things I'd never noticed before. Plus I end up spending ages online trying to identify every statue mentioned- the Michael Ayrton statues particularly fascinate me now. And the plot definitely did move on here and there's a wonderful greyness to the motives of a lot of the characters that I'm enjoying plus some fun timey-wimey stuff. Need to grab book 3 now.
The Paper Menagerie and other stories - Ken Liu Having read some of his translations and heard his name and several conventions lately I thought I really ought to read some Ken Liu and I'm very glad I did. There are some definite themes that show up again and again in these stories but also some really interesting set-ups and universes. The title story is a lovely, simple story about families and how difficult they can be but I also absolutely adored his take on generation ships (which were starting to get stale to me). But the one that is haunting me, though I don't think it was the best and it certainly wasn't my favourite, was The Man Who Ended History: A Documentary which should probably be read by all historians, teachers, journalists, politicians and anyone else who wants to think/talk/write about history as if it was something that can be pinned down or solved.
Prejudice & Pride: Celebrating LGBTQ History - Alison Oram & Matt Cook This is published by the National Trust alongside their current season. It tells some interesting stories but what impressed me the most (contrary to some of the press in the last few months) is how balance their language is in describing people's behaviour without forcing them into the boxes of modern language. I was interested by their choice when talking about individuals who changed the gender they presented as- they would use the gender the person was presenting as at the time so an article might switch from male to female in the middle. Talking about a modern trans person that would be wrong but I thought it was interesting when talking about individuals when we just don't know what gender they were or how they would want to be presented. Gives me lots more NT properties to visit too.
Last week I worked 7 days in a row but I didn't actually notice until the 7th day because I've been chopping my mental calendar up into weeks and not really looking between them much which is a mistake when you do things like accidentally work 7 days in a row OR, like next weekend, agree to cover something at 8am on a Sunday morning when you're going to a late night concert in London on the Saturday (oops?)
Anyway anytime I feel sorry for myself or too tired I just remind myself that my sister is currently walking to Jerusalem AND HAS SHINGLES /o\ I really don't know how she's doing it. Their latest blog entry is great fun though and involves an old school SimCity reference <3
Anyway tomorrow is relatively quiet other than having to cut up 20 milk bottles to make elephants and I can do that whilst watching TV so that'll be nice :-P
This entry was originally posted at https://morganmuffle.dreamwidth.org/1403949.html. Please comment there using OpenID.
Too busy for reading too if the number of books I read is anything to go by... though actually it's more that the first book took forever and I was stubborn and insisted on finishing it rather than moving on when I realised I wasn't entirely enjoying it.
- London Overground: A Day's Walk Around the Ginger Line - Iain Sinclair
- Ironhand - Charlie Fletcher
- The Paper Menagerie and other stories - Ken Liu
- Prejudice & Pride: Celebrating LGBTQ History - Alison Oram & Matt Cook
London Overground: A Day's Walk Around the Ginger Line - Iain Sinclair Well that slowed me down! I think on balance Iain Sinclair's style is not for me. I loved the concept of this book (walking the route of the London Overground in a day) and a lot of the anecdotes and descriptions are fascinating but he is SO pretentious and the guy he's walking with is a film maker of the performance art variety and everytime I found myself starting to get lost in it I'd be brought up short by some irritating phrase or self important pronouncement and have to stop reading. So... I probably don't recommend it I'm afraid. Though I did finish it.
Ironhand - Charlie Fletcher I really love this series, not really because of the plot or the characters (though they're pretty good) but because it completely warps the way I look at London. Every statue suddenly jumps out at me (metaphorically) and I notice things I'd never noticed before. Plus I end up spending ages online trying to identify every statue mentioned- the Michael Ayrton statues particularly fascinate me now. And the plot definitely did move on here and there's a wonderful greyness to the motives of a lot of the characters that I'm enjoying plus some fun timey-wimey stuff. Need to grab book 3 now.
The Paper Menagerie and other stories - Ken Liu Having read some of his translations and heard his name and several conventions lately I thought I really ought to read some Ken Liu and I'm very glad I did. There are some definite themes that show up again and again in these stories but also some really interesting set-ups and universes. The title story is a lovely, simple story about families and how difficult they can be but I also absolutely adored his take on generation ships (which were starting to get stale to me). But the one that is haunting me, though I don't think it was the best and it certainly wasn't my favourite, was The Man Who Ended History: A Documentary which should probably be read by all historians, teachers, journalists, politicians and anyone else who wants to think/talk/write about history as if it was something that can be pinned down or solved.
Prejudice & Pride: Celebrating LGBTQ History - Alison Oram & Matt Cook This is published by the National Trust alongside their current season. It tells some interesting stories but what impressed me the most (contrary to some of the press in the last few months) is how balance their language is in describing people's behaviour without forcing them into the boxes of modern language. I was interested by their choice when talking about individuals who changed the gender they presented as- they would use the gender the person was presenting as at the time so an article might switch from male to female in the middle. Talking about a modern trans person that would be wrong but I thought it was interesting when talking about individuals when we just don't know what gender they were or how they would want to be presented. Gives me lots more NT properties to visit too.
Last week I worked 7 days in a row but I didn't actually notice until the 7th day because I've been chopping my mental calendar up into weeks and not really looking between them much which is a mistake when you do things like accidentally work 7 days in a row OR, like next weekend, agree to cover something at 8am on a Sunday morning when you're going to a late night concert in London on the Saturday (oops?)
Anyway anytime I feel sorry for myself or too tired I just remind myself that my sister is currently walking to Jerusalem AND HAS SHINGLES /o\ I really don't know how she's doing it. Their latest blog entry is great fun though and involves an old school SimCity reference <3
Anyway tomorrow is relatively quiet other than having to cut up 20 milk bottles to make elephants and I can do that whilst watching TV so that'll be nice :-P
This entry was originally posted at https://morganmuffle.dreamwidth.org/1403949.html. Please comment there using OpenID.