50-book challenge 2011: books read July-December
You'd think that, what with being ill and all, I'd've done nothing but read over the past six months. Sad fact: you get to a stage where you're too fuzzy-brained even to read, even to re-read children's books. I did - just - get to the 50, but a lot of those are, in fact, re-reads, and a lot of them are children's books.
I don't have the energy to put in links to the titles, but I doubt that'll worry anyone. Will it?
Books read January-June
29. The Thirteen Treasures, Michelle Harrison - run of the mill, forgettable juvenile fantasy.
30. The Poison Tree, Erin Kelly - dull would-be psychological thriller peopled with unpleasant characters and improbable situations. Would like to be The Secret History, but isn’t.
31. Started Early, Took My Dog, Kate Atkinson - another outing for Jackson Brodie (and, indeed, his new-found dog), with the usual interweaving of numerous plots, some resolved satisfactorily, some not so much. Casts a very dim, though possibly not undeserved, light on ’70s police methods. The dog survives, at least for this book; I wouldn’t bet on its chances in further volumes.
32. The House at Midnight, Lucie Whitehouse - see The Poison Tree above. Completely different stories, but the same description applies.
33. Memories, Lucy M Boston - the autobiography of the author of the Green Knowe books: her early life in a prosperous Victorian household, her time spent nursing in the Great War, her acquisition of Green Knowe - excuse me, the Manor House at Hemingford Grey - and her life, not always entirely comfortable, there during the Second World War and beyond. Lucy Boston appears to have been quite a difficult and possibly a not very likeable woman, but she certainly knew her own mind, and carved her own niche in literary history.
34. A Scholar of Magics, Caroline Stevermer - sequel to A College of Magics; fantasy; not bad.
35. The Monsters of Templeton, Lauren Groff - a young woman investigates the history of her home town, uncovering all manner of monsters, human and otherwise. Curiously intertwined with the works and worlds of James Fenimore Cooper - which is rather lost on me, as I’m not familiar with him.
36. Darke, Angie Sage - book six in the Septimus Heap series, in which Septimus and his friends and family must battle a Darke Domain that has overwhelmed the castle. This is the American paperback edition, which I bought because I wasn’t entirely sure I’d be around long enough to see the UK paperback published. I mention this merely because this edition has the annoying habit of putting all the Magykal terms - Darke, Magyk, Thing, and so on - into bold type. Annoying, isn’t it?
37. The Vintner’s Luck, Elizabeth Knox - unusual, compelling, and beautifully written story of the almost century-long relationship between a French vintner and an angel.
38. The Angel’s Cut, Eizabeth Knox - sequel to the above: the angel, Xas, is now working in 1920’s Hollywood amongst the pioneers of film making, a thinly disguised Howard Hawks and Howard Hughes among them, whilst trying to elude his brother, Lucifer, and to save his friend Flora from her own mortality. An extraordinary work.
39. Three Men in a Boat, Jerome K Jerome - after reading the two Elizabeth Knox novels, I had difficulty in settling on anything new, especially as so many of the books I’d been reading had been disappointments, so fell back on this much-loved and often reread classic. It’s one of the books that everyone - yes, everyone, you too - should read before they die.
40. Jane Austen’s Guide to Romance: The Regency Rules, Lauren Henderson - speaking of disappointments: I’d read a number of novels by Lauren Henderson, and had assumed that this was a work of fiction. It is, in fact, a dating guide - not something for which I have a lot of use! Although, as to being a work of fiction: just how likely is it that the author really knows all those couples who so perfectly illustrate every relationship example she presents? This one’s going straight to Oxfam, I’m afraid.
41. Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand, Helen Simonson - moderately sweet tale of the romance between a retired Army man and the widow of the local (Pakistani) general store. The Pakistani characters are broad stereotypes, of course, but, then again, so are most of the white characters. And who’s to say there’s no truth in stereotypes?
42. Verdigris Deep, Frances Hardinge - Frances Hardinge has some claim to Diana Wynne Jones’s YA crown, although it’s early days yet, she’s only written four books. This is possibly my least favourite of the three I’ve so far read: there’s a slightly uncomfortable, unpleasant edge to it. But, then again, so there is to Wilkins’ Tooth, which is the DWJ this most reminds me of.
43. The Reluctant Widow, Georgette Heyer - at this point I went into hospital for, theoretically, five days (it turned out to be ten, but that’s another story), and, since I knew I wouldn’t be able to focus on anything new, I took in a couple of old favourites. As it turned out, after a few days I couldn’t focus on those, either, but that, too, is another story. This is one of my favourite Heyers: I prefer the ones with a solid plot to the straightforward romances, and this is a cracker, full of purloined documents, hidden staircases, violence in the night and murder most foul, all wrapped up in Heyer’s sparkling prose and acid wit.
44. The Toll-Gate, Georgette Heyer - another of Heyer’s more dramatic offerings: highwaymen, Bow Street Runners, stolen bullion, and a large, phlegmatic former Army officer who is more than a match for all of them. (My choice of Heyers, incidentally, was dictated by what I could reach: my books are double-stacked, and I wasn’t strong enough to get to anything with a title earlier in the alphabet.)
45. The Attenbury Emeralds, Jill Paton Walsh - an original Lord Peter Wimsey novel from Ms Walsh, who had previously written two Wimseys from Dorothy Sayer’s existing notes. Purists, for the most part, are not impressed, and the books are certainly far from flawless - there are a number of slips into non-contemporary language, and nothing will ever quite match Sayers’s own writing - but I enjoyed it for all its faults. It’s nothing short of a gift to have new Wimsey and Harriet, and I’m grateful for it. Although I do think Walsh might have been a little less hard on the Wimsey family.
46. Have His Carcase, Dorothy L Sayers - reading the above led me to return to the motherlode. This is the second Harriet Vane novel, in which Harriet finds what appears to be a fresh corpse on a deserted beach, she and Wimsey investigate, and the two of them develop their prickly and cautious relationship.
47. Murder Must Advertise, Dorothy L Sayers - one of my favourite Wimseys, in which Lord Peter goes undercover at an advertising agency. Fascinating for its glimpse into 1930’s office life, in which everyone dresses formally and addresses their colleagues by their last names.
48. The Five Red Herrings, Dorothy L Sayers - this was missing from our collection, so I bought a cheap copy from Amazon Marketplace (it’s a very cheap edition, so cheap that it’s not even typeset properly in a couple of places and you have to work out what order paragraphs should go in). This is not my favourite Wimsey by any manner of means: a lot of it is written in annoying dialect, anti-Semitism rears its ugly head, and the plot revolves around a lot of frankly tedious business involving railway timetables. Still, even a bad Wimsey is vastly superior to anything churned out nowadays.
49. Comet in Moominland, Tove Jansson - by now we’re coming up to the end of the year, I’m more than midway through my chemo, and I have no energy left to deal with anything much more strenuous than the Moomins. The Moomin books are either frivolous childish fluff or profound philosophical treatises; personally, I see no reason why they shouldn’t be both.
50. Finn Family Moomintroll, Tove Jansson.
51. The Exploits of Moominpappa, Tove Jansson.
52. Moominsummer Madness, Tove Jansson.
53. Moominland Midwinter, Tove Jansson - this is a favourite of mine, as not only does Little My feature heavily, it also introduces us to the wonderfully pragmatic Too-Ticky who (it says here) may have been based on Jansson’s life partner. In which case, lucky both of them.
54. Crime for Christmas, edited by Richard Dalby - a book of short stories seemed as good a way as any of trying to get back my reading mojo. The trouble with short stories is that, although they’re quick and easy to read - the exception to this is the Wilkie Collins novella at the end of this collection - they’re often not very good - the exception to this is not the Wilkie Collins novella … Only a couple of the stories in this were really worth reading; the rest of them just filled up time and pages.
Will we do better in 2012? Well, that kind of depends on Mr Crab, doesn't it. As do so many things.
This entry was originally posted at http://phoebesmum.dreamwidth.org/890994.html. Please comment there using OpenID. Or not, as you please.
I don't have the energy to put in links to the titles, but I doubt that'll worry anyone. Will it?
Books read January-June
29. The Thirteen Treasures, Michelle Harrison - run of the mill, forgettable juvenile fantasy.
30. The Poison Tree, Erin Kelly - dull would-be psychological thriller peopled with unpleasant characters and improbable situations. Would like to be The Secret History, but isn’t.
31. Started Early, Took My Dog, Kate Atkinson - another outing for Jackson Brodie (and, indeed, his new-found dog), with the usual interweaving of numerous plots, some resolved satisfactorily, some not so much. Casts a very dim, though possibly not undeserved, light on ’70s police methods. The dog survives, at least for this book; I wouldn’t bet on its chances in further volumes.
32. The House at Midnight, Lucie Whitehouse - see The Poison Tree above. Completely different stories, but the same description applies.
33. Memories, Lucy M Boston - the autobiography of the author of the Green Knowe books: her early life in a prosperous Victorian household, her time spent nursing in the Great War, her acquisition of Green Knowe - excuse me, the Manor House at Hemingford Grey - and her life, not always entirely comfortable, there during the Second World War and beyond. Lucy Boston appears to have been quite a difficult and possibly a not very likeable woman, but she certainly knew her own mind, and carved her own niche in literary history.
34. A Scholar of Magics, Caroline Stevermer - sequel to A College of Magics; fantasy; not bad.
35. The Monsters of Templeton, Lauren Groff - a young woman investigates the history of her home town, uncovering all manner of monsters, human and otherwise. Curiously intertwined with the works and worlds of James Fenimore Cooper - which is rather lost on me, as I’m not familiar with him.
36. Darke, Angie Sage - book six in the Septimus Heap series, in which Septimus and his friends and family must battle a Darke Domain that has overwhelmed the castle. This is the American paperback edition, which I bought because I wasn’t entirely sure I’d be around long enough to see the UK paperback published. I mention this merely because this edition has the annoying habit of putting all the Magykal terms - Darke, Magyk, Thing, and so on - into bold type. Annoying, isn’t it?
37. The Vintner’s Luck, Elizabeth Knox - unusual, compelling, and beautifully written story of the almost century-long relationship between a French vintner and an angel.
38. The Angel’s Cut, Eizabeth Knox - sequel to the above: the angel, Xas, is now working in 1920’s Hollywood amongst the pioneers of film making, a thinly disguised Howard Hawks and Howard Hughes among them, whilst trying to elude his brother, Lucifer, and to save his friend Flora from her own mortality. An extraordinary work.
39. Three Men in a Boat, Jerome K Jerome - after reading the two Elizabeth Knox novels, I had difficulty in settling on anything new, especially as so many of the books I’d been reading had been disappointments, so fell back on this much-loved and often reread classic. It’s one of the books that everyone - yes, everyone, you too - should read before they die.
40. Jane Austen’s Guide to Romance: The Regency Rules, Lauren Henderson - speaking of disappointments: I’d read a number of novels by Lauren Henderson, and had assumed that this was a work of fiction. It is, in fact, a dating guide - not something for which I have a lot of use! Although, as to being a work of fiction: just how likely is it that the author really knows all those couples who so perfectly illustrate every relationship example she presents? This one’s going straight to Oxfam, I’m afraid.
41. Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand, Helen Simonson - moderately sweet tale of the romance between a retired Army man and the widow of the local (Pakistani) general store. The Pakistani characters are broad stereotypes, of course, but, then again, so are most of the white characters. And who’s to say there’s no truth in stereotypes?
42. Verdigris Deep, Frances Hardinge - Frances Hardinge has some claim to Diana Wynne Jones’s YA crown, although it’s early days yet, she’s only written four books. This is possibly my least favourite of the three I’ve so far read: there’s a slightly uncomfortable, unpleasant edge to it. But, then again, so there is to Wilkins’ Tooth, which is the DWJ this most reminds me of.
43. The Reluctant Widow, Georgette Heyer - at this point I went into hospital for, theoretically, five days (it turned out to be ten, but that’s another story), and, since I knew I wouldn’t be able to focus on anything new, I took in a couple of old favourites. As it turned out, after a few days I couldn’t focus on those, either, but that, too, is another story. This is one of my favourite Heyers: I prefer the ones with a solid plot to the straightforward romances, and this is a cracker, full of purloined documents, hidden staircases, violence in the night and murder most foul, all wrapped up in Heyer’s sparkling prose and acid wit.
44. The Toll-Gate, Georgette Heyer - another of Heyer’s more dramatic offerings: highwaymen, Bow Street Runners, stolen bullion, and a large, phlegmatic former Army officer who is more than a match for all of them. (My choice of Heyers, incidentally, was dictated by what I could reach: my books are double-stacked, and I wasn’t strong enough to get to anything with a title earlier in the alphabet.)
45. The Attenbury Emeralds, Jill Paton Walsh - an original Lord Peter Wimsey novel from Ms Walsh, who had previously written two Wimseys from Dorothy Sayer’s existing notes. Purists, for the most part, are not impressed, and the books are certainly far from flawless - there are a number of slips into non-contemporary language, and nothing will ever quite match Sayers’s own writing - but I enjoyed it for all its faults. It’s nothing short of a gift to have new Wimsey and Harriet, and I’m grateful for it. Although I do think Walsh might have been a little less hard on the Wimsey family.
46. Have His Carcase, Dorothy L Sayers - reading the above led me to return to the motherlode. This is the second Harriet Vane novel, in which Harriet finds what appears to be a fresh corpse on a deserted beach, she and Wimsey investigate, and the two of them develop their prickly and cautious relationship.
47. Murder Must Advertise, Dorothy L Sayers - one of my favourite Wimseys, in which Lord Peter goes undercover at an advertising agency. Fascinating for its glimpse into 1930’s office life, in which everyone dresses formally and addresses their colleagues by their last names.
48. The Five Red Herrings, Dorothy L Sayers - this was missing from our collection, so I bought a cheap copy from Amazon Marketplace (it’s a very cheap edition, so cheap that it’s not even typeset properly in a couple of places and you have to work out what order paragraphs should go in). This is not my favourite Wimsey by any manner of means: a lot of it is written in annoying dialect, anti-Semitism rears its ugly head, and the plot revolves around a lot of frankly tedious business involving railway timetables. Still, even a bad Wimsey is vastly superior to anything churned out nowadays.
49. Comet in Moominland, Tove Jansson - by now we’re coming up to the end of the year, I’m more than midway through my chemo, and I have no energy left to deal with anything much more strenuous than the Moomins. The Moomin books are either frivolous childish fluff or profound philosophical treatises; personally, I see no reason why they shouldn’t be both.
50. Finn Family Moomintroll, Tove Jansson.
51. The Exploits of Moominpappa, Tove Jansson.
52. Moominsummer Madness, Tove Jansson.
53. Moominland Midwinter, Tove Jansson - this is a favourite of mine, as not only does Little My feature heavily, it also introduces us to the wonderfully pragmatic Too-Ticky who (it says here) may have been based on Jansson’s life partner. In which case, lucky both of them.
54. Crime for Christmas, edited by Richard Dalby - a book of short stories seemed as good a way as any of trying to get back my reading mojo. The trouble with short stories is that, although they’re quick and easy to read - the exception to this is the Wilkie Collins novella at the end of this collection - they’re often not very good - the exception to this is not the Wilkie Collins novella … Only a couple of the stories in this were really worth reading; the rest of them just filled up time and pages.
Will we do better in 2012? Well, that kind of depends on Mr Crab, doesn't it. As do so many things.
This entry was originally posted at http://phoebesmum.dreamwidth.org/890994.html. Please comment there using OpenID. Or not, as you please.