September 2010 books
This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 2023. Every six-ish days I've been revisiting a month from my recent past, noting work and family developments as well as the books I read in that month. I've found it a pleasantly cathartic process, especially in recent circumstances. If you want to look back at previous entries, they are all tagged under bookblog nostalgia
Some travel this month, with a trip to Berlin to give a lecture, another to Moldova, and a lovely reunion in Cambridge, which inspired poetry. There was going to be another Cambridge reunion exactly a year ago; but it was cancelled due to the you-know-what. I bought myself a smartphone, a HTC Desire, which I rapidly grew to hate.
My trip to Moldova was truncated by big family drama, as B was hospitalised with food poisoning; I could not get back until very late, so Anne found alternative accommodation for F and U and stayed in hospital with her - B cannot talk, and can be rather difficult if people mess with her (eg, giving her medicine, or more specifically putting a drip in her arm). I had seen her just the weekend before; basically if you have a habit of putting your finger in your mouth without washing your hands first, you run a risk of an upset stomach.
She made a quick and full recovery, and next time I visited her I took time to take some pictures of the chapel Onze-Lieve-Vrouw-ten-Steen in the vicinity.
With one thing and another, I read only 17 books that month.
Non-fiction 2 (YTD 54)
Unfinest Hour: Britain and the Destruction of Bosnia, by Brendan Simms
The Great Transformation, by Karen Armstrong
Non-genre fiction 3 (YTD 36)
Silas Marner, by George Eliot
Set in Darkness, by Ian Rankin
The Shell Seekers, by Rosamunde Pilcher
SF (not Who) 5 (YTD 60)
A Wizard Abroad, by Diane Duane
Visions of Wonder, ed. David Hartwell and Milton Wolf
Red Mars, by Kim Stanley Robinson
Green Mars, by Kim Stanley Robinson
Blue Mars, by Kim Stanley Robinson
Doctor Who 5 (YTD 51, 57 counting comics and non-fiction)
Doctor Who Annual 1974
Festival of Death, by Jonathan Morris
Dreamstone Moon, by Paul Leonard
The Story of Martha, by Dan Abnett
Doctor Who Annual 1975
Comics 2 (YTD 14)
Daredevil: Wake Up, by Brian Michael Bendis and David Mack
The Only Good Dalek by Justin Richards and Mike Collins
~6,300 pages (YTD ~69,400)
4/17 (YTD 46/219) by women (Armstrong, Eliot, Pilcher, Duane)
0/17 (YTD 16/219) by PoC
I loved my return to Mars with Kim Stanley Robinson. You can get Red Mars here, Green Mars here and Blue Mars here. Best first time reads were Inspector Rebus Set in Darkness, which you can get here, and against my expectations The Shell Seekers, which you can get here. On the other hand, Karen Armstrong totally failed to convince me of the significance of the fact that Confucius, the Buddha, Socrates and Jeremiah all lived at about the same time; you can get The Great Transformation here.
Some travel this month, with a trip to Berlin to give a lecture, another to Moldova, and a lovely reunion in Cambridge, which inspired poetry. There was going to be another Cambridge reunion exactly a year ago; but it was cancelled due to the you-know-what. I bought myself a smartphone, a HTC Desire, which I rapidly grew to hate.
My trip to Moldova was truncated by big family drama, as B was hospitalised with food poisoning; I could not get back until very late, so Anne found alternative accommodation for F and U and stayed in hospital with her - B cannot talk, and can be rather difficult if people mess with her (eg, giving her medicine, or more specifically putting a drip in her arm). I had seen her just the weekend before; basically if you have a habit of putting your finger in your mouth without washing your hands first, you run a risk of an upset stomach.
She made a quick and full recovery, and next time I visited her I took time to take some pictures of the chapel Onze-Lieve-Vrouw-ten-Steen in the vicinity.
With one thing and another, I read only 17 books that month.
Non-fiction 2 (YTD 54)
Unfinest Hour: Britain and the Destruction of Bosnia, by Brendan Simms
The Great Transformation, by Karen Armstrong
Non-genre fiction 3 (YTD 36)
Silas Marner, by George Eliot
Set in Darkness, by Ian Rankin
The Shell Seekers, by Rosamunde Pilcher
SF (not Who) 5 (YTD 60)
A Wizard Abroad, by Diane Duane
Visions of Wonder, ed. David Hartwell and Milton Wolf
Red Mars, by Kim Stanley Robinson
Green Mars, by Kim Stanley Robinson
Blue Mars, by Kim Stanley Robinson
Doctor Who 5 (YTD 51, 57 counting comics and non-fiction)
Doctor Who Annual 1974
Festival of Death, by Jonathan Morris
Dreamstone Moon, by Paul Leonard
The Story of Martha, by Dan Abnett
Doctor Who Annual 1975
Comics 2 (YTD 14)
Daredevil: Wake Up, by Brian Michael Bendis and David Mack
The Only Good Dalek by Justin Richards and Mike Collins
~6,300 pages (YTD ~69,400)
4/17 (YTD 46/219) by women (Armstrong, Eliot, Pilcher, Duane)
0/17 (YTD 16/219) by PoC
I loved my return to Mars with Kim Stanley Robinson. You can get Red Mars here, Green Mars here and Blue Mars here. Best first time reads were Inspector Rebus Set in Darkness, which you can get here, and against my expectations The Shell Seekers, which you can get here. On the other hand, Karen Armstrong totally failed to convince me of the significance of the fact that Confucius, the Buddha, Socrates and Jeremiah all lived at about the same time; you can get The Great Transformation here.