larryhammer: a wisp of smoke, label: "it comes in curlicues, spirals as it twirls" (curlicues)
[personal profile] larryhammer
Reading, reading (and meming every once in a while):

Read: Surface Detail by Iain M. Banks - One of the better Culture novels, all told, though not a good entry to the series. There is a connection to an earlier Culture book, the identity of which is a bit spoilery. But it's interesting to compare such lookbacks as Look to Windward's to Consider Phlebas and The Hydrogen Sonata's to Excession.

Arabella, another reread of a Georgette Heyer I remembered nothing of -- and another that is pleasant enough mid-level Heyer. Give the hero +1 for being a social troll.

Reading: Karen Memory by Elizabeth Bear - Steampunk in the wild west, with a 16-year-old prostitute for a narrator -- one with an engaging voice and a turn for phrases as vivid as a bottle-green cravat. Does less erasure of those disadvantaged by the imperialist bent behind steampunk tropes than all too many works. Or so far, anyway -- am ~2/3 through.

DNF: Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell - I liked this, but found it painful. I mean, I'm two years older than the protagonists. I remember this stuff. It's not a historical novel to me. It's not exactly memoir, either, but enough is all too familiar to make this a not quick read for me -- and so it came due at library before I finished.

---L.

Subject quote from "Tony," Patty Griffin.

Date: 29 July 2015 10:08 pm (UTC)
sovay: (I Claudius)
From: [personal profile] sovay
Give the hero +1 for being a social troll.

Details? I've seen this one around my mother's house, but I have not read it.

Date: 30 July 2015 03:25 pm (UTC)
sovay: (Cho Hakkai: intelligence)
From: [personal profile] sovay
He is sardonically amused by this idea, and once spent three days wearing a dandelion in his buttonhole just to see if he could get imitators to follow him (they did).

That is excellent.

Date: 30 July 2015 07:45 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] puddleshark.livejournal.com
I read Arabella a few weeks ago - it couldn't have been too bad because I did finish it, but now I cannot remember a single thing about it.

Did not finish The Talisman Ring. The hero had a very manly name but no other distinguishing characteristics, and as for the horribly vivacious and wilful young Frenchwoman... *shudders*

January 2026

S M T W T F S
     1 23
4 5678910
11 121314151617
1819 20 2122 2324
25262728293031

Most Popular Tags

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags
Page generated 26 January 2026 07:53 pm
Powered by Dreamwidth Studios