Updates

Finally! I'm back in my apt after a weekend conference in Utah. I'm hoping that's an end to the traveling for now.

I enjoy seeing new places. However, my poor apt has been badly neglected during my repeated absences, and my tomato plants have gone feral. I've also missed out on apt pool parties and other things that might have helped me get to know my neighbours more. This is an Ongoing Project (tm). I have more of a network now than I did in my whiny post of a year ago, but I don't have a community. It'd be nice to have one again.

My impressions of Utah were mostly confined to the inside of a hotel in Park City, but I escaped long enough to see the 1812 Overture performed on a mountainside with full-on cannon-fire. For the record, I am not cut out to be a 19C soldier. Them cannons are loud and scary.

Coming up: work, work, whitewater rafting, work, and hopefully seeing people.

What about you lot?

Being on planes means I read a lot

So, on the advice of a CW friend, I gave Rothfuss's The Name of the Wind another try, and... liked it.

This is unexpected, because TNOTW is very much a wish-fulfillment story about a Super-Talented, Awesome Character Whose Only Flaws Make Him Yet More Awesome. In short, it's the kind of thing I usually despise. But TNOTW works, in part because of the confidence of the storytelling, and in part because of the layered narration.
 
Kvothe is presented as a figure of mystery in the first two chapters, which means by the time he gets around to telling his story, I genuinely wanted to find out more about him. It's a clever narrative trick, and one I'll have to remember.

State of the Reading Union: the year so far

Oh, hell. Given that I've done one book review, and I'm officially Taking the Night Off from Work, why not do them all?

According to my google books record, I've read 48 books for pleasure so far this year. These are the best of them:

Non Fiction

1) The immortal life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

A gripping page-turner that made me contemplate African-Americans' relationship to  medicine in a new light.

2) Zeitoun by Dave Eggers (Audiobook)

Oh, this book made me so mad! It's an astonishing and poignient account of a) Hurricane Katrina, b) what it means to be Muslim in America, and c) reasons why you should not trust your government. The audiobook was brilliant. I recommend it.

3) The Poisoner's Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz ... by Deborah Blum

An awkwardly written but fascinating account of how one man turned the office of city coroner into a respectable (and effective) crime-solving unit. I'd never heard of cases like the New Jersey Radium Poisoning before, so they provided entertaining and sometimes frightening insights into early 20C America. After reading this book I stopped being blase about household chemicals and started wearing plastic gloves while cleaning.

4) In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin by Erik Larson

The second half of this book was disappointing, but the first half was a very compelling account of what it's like to be standing in the path of history, unaware that the light ahead is an oncoming train.


Memoir (aka "Might be Fiction for all I know")

Lit: A Memoir by Mary Karr (Audio Book)

I didn't like "The Liar's Club" so I didn't expect to like this memoir. However, I found Karr's meditation on spirituality very compelling. It helped that she herself was reading the audio book; it made the "voice" of the narrative make more sense, and made Karr herself seem less obnoxious.

Next up: fiction

State of the Reading Union: Pt 2

Fiction (in no particular order)

The Amulet of Samarkand by Jonathan Stroud

One of my colleagues recommended this children's fantasy to me. It's a quirky, neo-Victorian fantasy narrated in part by a sarcastic, enslaved djinni. After reading that sentence, you already know if this is your thing or not. Enjoy.

A Dance with Dragons by George R.R. Martin

Enough said.

A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan

This isn't usually my kind of book, but it's so well done, I ended up plowing right through it. Egan has a masterful command of language and character. Even if you're not a "lit fic" type, it's worth having a look at this one.

The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by N. K. Jemisin

An astonishing high fantasy debut. I've already had many things to say about how good it is, so if you like fantasy, go read it already.

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy by John Le Carré

This is a very different type of fiction than I'm used to. It doesn't pander to the reader, doesn't bother explaining the professional jargon, just drops you into the middle of Cold War espionage and lets you watch what unfolds. Also, I love the dialog. More supervillains should talk the way these spies do.

Short Story Collections


What we talk about when we talk about love by Raymond Carver

Carver's often talked about as a symbol of What MFA Programs Try To Write. You know what? His stories bear very little resemblance to the bad lit prose I've read. He had a brilliant, economical grasp of character and situation, and his stories are precisely-cut gems of pain.

There once lived a woman who tried to kill her neighbor's baby by Li︠u︡dmila Petrushevskai︠a︡ 

Another short story that shows what can be done with brevity, and in this case, the form of the fairy tale. Very different from any other short stories I've read.