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Feb. 2nd, 2009 02:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
skygiantsA couple of ongoing series books to log today -
After reading a few awesome Cadfael fics in the Yuletide archive, I am finally back on the (veeery slow) Big Cadfael Reread I started last spring! The Leper of St. Giles is not a hugely memorable Cadfael mystery, which means that a.) I remembered basically nothing about it when I read it and therefore b.) I have no idea whether I figured out who the murderer was on page five because of my Natural Detectin' Skill (which would be nice to think!) or because I remembered from reading it before. I miss Hugh and I have almost no interest in the leading romantic pairing, but I do adore Brother Mark and Brother Oswin. Possibly because I am basically Brother Oswin. (Clumsy and bumbling, check; blithely optimistic, check; cheerfully oblivious, check!) I can't remember if he turns up in more books but I hope he does!
The other series I have been stalled on for a few months and just got back into continuing is Philip Reeve's Hungry City Chronicles. These are set in a postapocalyptic future where the rule is city-eat-city; they start out with a relatively light coming-of-age-adventure tone for a surprisingly dark universe, and get interestingly darker as they go on. I had Infernal Devices, the third book book, sitting around in my room for months despite the amazing title, but now I am super-excited to read the fourth - in large part because, after being frustrated by my favorite character for three quarters of the book, she pulled it out at the very end and became even more of an AWESOME STONE-COLD BADASS. Everything else I want to say is spoilery!
SHE DUMPED TOM. THAT IS AWESOME. I am not all that interested in Tom, but more importantly I was super-frustrated with Tom being her entire motivation for this whole book (and the last one) and now maybe she will get NEW and EXCITING motivations and get to put her stone-cold badassery to good use!
I am half-ashamed to admit that I now actually kind of 'ship Hester/Zombie Robot Grike, but . . . dude, it's probably healthier than Hester/Tom. And they can be stone-cold badasses together!
Meanwhile, I have always had problems with the whole Anna Fang plot - WHY is everyone obsessed with Tom? It makes no sense to me! - but I have to admit that Multiple Personalities Zombie Robot Ex-General Surrogate Mother Anna Fang is sort of hysterical as a concept. And I did quite like Wren by the end, though I spent most of the first half of the book wanting to throw things at her. And in general, I love that the series is kind of growing into the darkness of the premise; I loved Oenone, and the sequence where she zombie-robitinates her brother was awesomely creepy. And in conclusion the last one just got bumped way high up on my reading list!
After reading a few awesome Cadfael fics in the Yuletide archive, I am finally back on the (veeery slow) Big Cadfael Reread I started last spring! The Leper of St. Giles is not a hugely memorable Cadfael mystery, which means that a.) I remembered basically nothing about it when I read it and therefore b.) I have no idea whether I figured out who the murderer was on page five because of my Natural Detectin' Skill (which would be nice to think!) or because I remembered from reading it before. I miss Hugh and I have almost no interest in the leading romantic pairing, but I do adore Brother Mark and Brother Oswin. Possibly because I am basically Brother Oswin. (Clumsy and bumbling, check; blithely optimistic, check; cheerfully oblivious, check!) I can't remember if he turns up in more books but I hope he does!
The other series I have been stalled on for a few months and just got back into continuing is Philip Reeve's Hungry City Chronicles. These are set in a postapocalyptic future where the rule is city-eat-city; they start out with a relatively light coming-of-age-adventure tone for a surprisingly dark universe, and get interestingly darker as they go on. I had Infernal Devices, the third book book, sitting around in my room for months despite the amazing title, but now I am super-excited to read the fourth - in large part because, after being frustrated by my favorite character for three quarters of the book, she pulled it out at the very end and became even more of an AWESOME STONE-COLD BADASS. Everything else I want to say is spoilery!
SHE DUMPED TOM. THAT IS AWESOME. I am not all that interested in Tom, but more importantly I was super-frustrated with Tom being her entire motivation for this whole book (and the last one) and now maybe she will get NEW and EXCITING motivations and get to put her stone-cold badassery to good use!
I am half-ashamed to admit that I now actually kind of 'ship Hester/Zombie Robot Grike, but . . . dude, it's probably healthier than Hester/Tom. And they can be stone-cold badasses together!
Meanwhile, I have always had problems with the whole Anna Fang plot - WHY is everyone obsessed with Tom? It makes no sense to me! - but I have to admit that Multiple Personalities Zombie Robot Ex-General Surrogate Mother Anna Fang is sort of hysterical as a concept. And I did quite like Wren by the end, though I spent most of the first half of the book wanting to throw things at her. And in general, I love that the series is kind of growing into the darkness of the premise; I loved Oenone, and the sequence where she zombie-robitinates her brother was awesomely creepy. And in conclusion the last one just got bumped way high up on my reading list!
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Date: 2009-02-02 09:28 pm (UTC)This reminds me I have some belated book logging to be doing, for some reason I've read at least three books recently of Victorian oddness.
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Date: 2009-02-02 09:31 pm (UTC)Victoriana makes me happy! :D I'm looking forward to seeing your booklogging.
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Date: 2009-02-02 09:34 pm (UTC)Oh yes, they were three rather odd books, two takes on Sherlock Holmes and one just weird one that Danii had read too.
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Date: 2009-02-02 09:39 pm (UTC)- oh, was that the Lamplighters book that she was talking about on her LJ the other day?
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Date: 2009-02-02 10:07 pm (UTC)If you see something called The Somnabulist run away, run very far.
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Date: 2009-02-02 11:57 pm (UTC)I really like Philip Reeve -- can't remember, have you read Larklight? It's also a ripping good read though much lighter in tone and subject matter. But even though he writes interesting female characters -- sometimes even more than two in the same book! -- I do think he's got some issues with women. (See: zombie robot surrogate mother Anna Fang.)
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Date: 2009-02-03 03:43 am (UTC)- out of curiosity, though, now I have to know what made it so terrible!
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Date: 2009-02-03 03:49 am (UTC)OH YES LARKLIGHT I adore it, and Starcross, and am currently in a sulk-fit at the NY public library systems because they do not have Mothstorm yet
thus necessitating me to read it in bits and pieces in the bookstore while I wait for it to come out in paperback.I love how completely un-seriously he takes his Victorians in spaaace, and I love how Myrtle is prim and restricted and amazingly awesome all at once.But yes I also think you are right, with the women issues thing - well, I think he is really legitimately trying hard to write strong female characters, which I respect him for, but often he forgets and slips in his own issues (see: the fact that the only person to make zombie robot surrogate mother Anna Fang ~feel something~ is the male lead, who she interacted with for a total of like three pages! Instead of any of the mostly-female people she was actually close to! That still makes me scowl.)
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Date: 2009-02-03 04:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-04 06:02 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-04 06:40 pm (UTC)Oh fine, you should go read it then but be warned, its Weird.
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Date: 2009-02-04 07:02 pm (UTC)