Books read, late January

[mrissa]

Mishell Baker, Borderline. Do you ever do the thing where you get in your head that a book is something utterly different than what it was? For some reason I thought this was going to be near-future SF. There is no good reason for this; none of the jacket copy says so, because it isn’t. What it is, is urban fantasy, quite good urban fantasy in a

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[whswhs]

I picked up Impersonations for my Kindle app, never having read anything else in the series, and I both liked it and could figure out what was going on. In fact I liked it enough to give it to a friend for a solstice gift, without worrying about whether it would make sense to him. So I think Williams did a capable job of establishing the backstory.

(The Williams I'd read before this was Metropolitan/City on Fire and the Drake Maijstral books. The Maijstral series was a total delight to me, my favorite SF humor since Panshin, and Williams actually wrote the entire series!)

[desperance]

"Congress of Vienna" was the first dance at our wedding. We were not fit for dancing, but we kinda sat in the middle and people waltzed around us. It was awesome. (And if you give her half a chance, K will show you her wedding compilation of photos all set to the music of...)

Also I just read "Dread Empire's Fall", so new stories in that milieu are entirely a propos...

[asakiyume]

I really like what you say about a new editorial team pulling new, interesting stuff out of writers in your comments on The Starlit Wood.

Homeless Moon is a great title for a chapbook.

I probably won't get around to reading it, but what you write about The Rarest Blue is fascinating, too.

[mrissa]

Homeless Moon is the name of their writers' group. I am biased in favor of Michael, Scott, and Justin, but I have never met Erin and she wrote one of my favorite poems of last year, so I think even if Jason is the word person in the world (which I doubt) I am going to have to give the whole HM thing thumbs up.

[mamculuna]

Underground Railroad, yes. I thought it was amazing. Just the right kind of...magic realism? Surrealism? I don't need to label it, but he did it so well. But painful indeed. I have to reread it for a book club later this year and I'm sure that will be hard.

[mrissa]

Just the right kind of lack of adherence to mimetic realism, yes.

[txanne]

The Rarest Blue sounds like it's right up my alley!

[mrissa]

Read it, and then you can join me and Tim going "WHAT?"

[txanne]

That's so much fun! I went "WHAT??" several times during The Perfect Red, too. (Now I want people to write me the histories of all the other colors! Tyrian purple! Burnt umber! Fuligin!..wait that one is going on with those two artists in real time.)