flaviomatani: (mornington crescent)
( Aug. 23rd, 2021 10:11 am)
Haven't posted much of late as my mind has been preoccupied with the current horror show I'm facing with my health and the hoops I'll have to jump. Funnily, that has made the Shell situation (where a large transnational insists that I'm their gas customer and are trying to charge me some eight thousand pounds as according to them I've never paid -whilst I've been with the Co-Op/Octopus that whole time and I'm reasonably happy with them, insofar as you can be with an energy supplier) -this has suddenly become far less threatening, with something so much bigger on my mind.

Apart from that, I still haven't been to a club night -and very likely won't be until that health issue gets resolved, which will take a fair while. I have been to one friends' picnic which was very good and didn't feel crowded in. And yesterday I met a friend mid-afternoon at the Pineapple, a local pub here in KT. And that was absolutely lovely, to catch up with a friend in person and, apart from inevitably boring her with the gruesome details of my current health thing, hear how she's doing and where her life is going.

Other things: the current book for Bibliogoth I'm liking a whole lot more than the previous one. It is 'A Woman of No Importance', by Sonia Purnell, a biography of Virginia Hall, an American spying for the British in Vichy France during WW2.

Something I never did properly when I was studying music was to learn the piano; had two years of piano as a secondary subject but it was very much secondary and our teacher had 'ideas' and made us spend most of the first year with lid closed, practising dropping wrist and passing thumb under. When my midi keyboard died late last year I decided to replace it with the cheapest digi piano I could find that had hammer-action -a Casio. It probably wouldn't withstand somebody practising a diploma level concert on it but it is ideal for me. So I find myself in the curious situation that I'm quite professionally proficient on one instrument and a complete beginner on another. It is fun, though, and it has taught me a lot about how somebody my age reacts to learning a new instrument. This has already been useful for my guitar teaching.

It's taken me most of the month to read the first hundred pages of the book set for next month's Bibliogoth. The book in question is 'The Way of All Flesh' by 'Ambrose Perry'. It is failing to get me into that world -I don't think it is badly written but I'm not there with it, alas.

OTOH, I've read the whole Raksura series by [personal profile] marthawells   in a week. And there I did fall headlong inside that world, even though I don't think I'm that much of a fantasy fan these days. These slightly monster-like shape-shifters I found more believably human than.... the characters in many other books, shall we say. In truth, at first I was thinking of getting the Murderbot series, of which I read and liked a lot the first one, but I felt that the precarious state of my pocket might resent spending seven or eight quid each for half a dozen novellas of less than two hundred pages each. I probably will buy them at some point but that imight not be today. In the mean time, I enjoyed my stay in the Three Worlds, the only thing that I would have liked to see more of is the story and the backstory of Consolation, the half-Fell Queen. Hope that comes to happen at some point, although Wells might just have moved on from that world.

In the unlikely case anyone wonders, the icon pic is the Book of G'Quan from Babylon 5, one other world I still like to dive in from time to time.
The Bear and The NightingaleThe Bear and The Nightingale by Katherine Arden

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Loved this story. Don't know much (or anything at all, really) about the folk lore and myths of Russia but this sparked a curiosity. There was an interesting thread about this in Bibliogoth when we were discussing the book (yesterday, as I write this). The consensus was that the characters were a little bit stereotypical, the plot did derive to an extent from old Russian folklore stories. None of this mattered to me, I really liked this book.



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Ancillary Sword (Imperial Radch #2)Ancillary Sword by Ann Leckie

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


That was a good story. Damn, now I'll have to get the remaining book in this series. Or however many, if there's more than one.



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Frankissstein: A Love StoryFrankissstein: A Love Story by Jeanette Winterson

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I hated the title. And the day-glow pink cover. And it took me a while to get into the book -contrary to what I was expecting, I took better to the Mary Shelley part of the story at first. It did grow on me, however and I ended up liking it. There's been a few of this kind of riffing on a previous literary work, like the Hag Seed by Margaret Atwood -which, again I didn't think I would take to and ended up liking a lot.

The book is an easy read and there's a bit more than meets the eye at first. I liked it.



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Fireheart TigerFireheart Tiger by Aliette de Bodard

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


A short but sweet read. I read that in two sittings. Not perhaps the sort of fantasy that I would be engrossed in, it did make me live in the fantasy Viet-Nam world it is set for the little while it lasted and left me wanting to hear more, which is a good thing. Would I read it again? For sure. It wouldn't take long, in any case.



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The Silence of the GirlsThe Silence of the Girls by Pat Barker




Somewhat complicated. I loved the book, the characters are believable. The story... we all know the story. Or rather, we all think we know the story. This is told by a former princess who is now a slave. Or at least the first half of the book it is, then longer and longer episodes in the third person appear. This jarred a little bit for a while, although I got used to the style and could see the reason for it. Also the role of Greek mythology, which at first appears as such and as the book progresses becomes more 'real'. Finally, this is called the 'Silence of the Girls' but it is for the most part the story of one woman but centred around men -and most of what she has to say is about those men. Understandably, perhaps, given her situation, but it did strike me that most of the women in this story were for the most part still silent. Only Polyxena, about to die, seems to have a voice even as she is gagged and muzzled. Another thing that bothered me a bit although again it can be explained in the context is the sort of Stockholm's syndrome that she develops. It was, nonetheless, a very compelling read, very well written.



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The End of Everything (Astrophysically Speaking)The End of Everything by Katie Mack

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


What's the worst that could happen? Funny how exhilarating it can be to read about the end of the world. Or possible ends of the world. Katie Mack turns this -which surely starts as long rows of numbers and calculations based on observations that lead to more numbers and calculations- into a very compelling read. I loved it.



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The Stone Sky (The Broken Earth, #3)The Stone Sky by N.K. Jemisin

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Loved this series. Was left wanting more, which is quite something after three volumes of it. In the intersection between science-fiction and fantasy, it reaches a good conclusion to the story, although the future is still open.



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The Obelisk Gate (The Broken Earth, #2)The Obelisk Gate by N.K. Jemisin

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


I liked this one even more than the first one. Now I'm half-way through the third instalment. Bit grim at times but a very good story and the characters are credible -if a lot of what they do break a lot of laws of physics! and the geological setting is a bit improbable. But it is a very good story, very well told.



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Into the London Fog: Eerie Tales from the Weird City (British Library Tales of the Weird Book 16)Into the London Fog: Eerie Tales from the Weird City by Elizabeth Dearnley




A collection of short stories based around the theme of the London pea-super fog. I found it rather uneven and perhaps oddly I found the couple of essays (one by Virginia Woolf, one by Claude McKay, fair more interesting than the stories, which I would have loved when I was 14 but at this point I found rather predictable and so-so; not terrible but not that very exciting. Still, enough of the book is a good read that it is work the while. And of course you might have different tastes and not agree with me.



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MaddAddamMaddAddam by Margaret Atwood

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


I loved this world. Well, it is a bit grim but engagijng, a post-apocalyptic world where a man made plague has wiped out the human race (yes, it does sound, in the current times, like one of the wackiest conspiracy theories going round), with the run up to this (with corporations running the world including law and order, justice and health -sounds a bit familiar..) constituting the bulk of the story. The characters are believably human (with perhaps a couple of exceptions -'Blanco' was clearly more of a plot device than a person). The story was engaging and the world made sense in itself almost all the time. So far I've liked pretty much everything that I've read of Atwood's and, as I've recently found out, she is also a good person, with clear views on the right side of things.



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The Pursuit of William AbbeyThe Pursuit of William Abbey by Claire North

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Enjoyed this book. Similar device to the one the author uses in 'Sudden Appearance of Hope' but I felt better carried out in this one. The climax and resolution felt rather contrived -but of course the initial premise of the book is also quite contrived. Some of the characters felt a bit unreal (not talking about Langa here!) but the main characters felt 'real' enough to carry the plot forward. A good read, overall.



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The Girl with Seven Names: A North Korean Defector's StoryThe Girl with Seven Names: A North Korean Defector's Story by Hyeonseo Lee

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


We discussed this book on the June meeting of Bibliogoth (these days of plague, of course, online). For me it was an easy read, which may be paradoxical given the many horrendous things she describes. It is not perhaps a great work of literature but it is not, I think, meant to be. It is the account of an incredible odyssey by a young woman -almost a child, at the time she leaves North Korea-, her courage, extraordinarily good luck against all odds and also the mistakes and bad choices she made along the way. It has a happy ending, she's in the end reunited with her family out of Korea (is this a spoiler?) but of course she survived to tell the tale. It is easy to imagine that many, perhaps thousands, do not. It is a very good read.



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Oryx and Crake (MaddAddam, #1)Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


A very good story but perhaps not one that you would want to read during a pandemic... much more science-fiction-y than pretty much anything else by Margaret Atwood I've read (Handmaid's Tale is not really science-fiction, rather politics-fiction). Or, rather, apocalyptic fiction. It is, as one would expect from Atwood, very well threaded and it takes you some weird places. I enjoyed it a lot and will very very likely read the rest of the series.



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The future is a bit uncertain, although at least I'll have _some_ income from the schools I teach guitar at in the next three months. Beyond that, who knows. This situation could last longer, perhaps quite a bit longer, than that. In the meantime, my 36m² flat keeps shrinking, getting a bit smaller each day. I have enough 'virtual' social interaction, last night there was the usual Gothsluts pub meeting, only now virtual, happening on Zoom (comment by [livejournal.com profile] andyravensable : 'the drinks are cheaper and the music is better...'), also Bibliogoth, various friends' virtual parties and my own private guitar lessons, although I need quite a bit more of the latter.

A lot of people report inexplicable tiredness and sleep trouble -I've had both. it is just the stress of being in this situation without a clear end in sight, I s'pose. 

Pity that I just cannot get on with the book for the next Bibliogoth meeting: 'Our Lady of the Flowers' by André Gide. I knew of him, I'd read something by him when I was younger and I don't find his salaciousness shocking (as I did then) but his writing style makes it hard work for me and I find myself not caring for his characters or what happens to them. Will look into the new Hugo Awards list that [personal profile] sfred  posted, there might be something better for me there (we already had 'This is how you lose the Time Wars' last month in Bibliogoth). Have been watching 'Picard' and 'The Expanse' and a documentary on Robert Johnson the bluesman. Ran out of all three now... also, I've been practising guitar a lot! Which is good and necessary and does do quite a bit to help preserve (what's left of) my sanity.

The future is uncertain. But then it always was. In the meantime, we move on forward...
Hag-Seed: The Tempest Retold (Hogarth Shakespeare)Hag-Seed: The Tempest Retold by Margaret Atwood

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


This was the set book for Bibliogoth's meeting of December 2019. I absolutely loved it. One might think beforehand that, since you would already know the original, there would be no surprises or twists -but there are. The counterpoint between the original story and its recreation was, at least to me, superbly done; there is a sort of game of mirrors between the different characters, the original characters they represent and, it seemed to me, the fact that there was more than one character representing, to some extent or other, one of the original ones. Loved the book.



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Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the DeadDrive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Tokarczuk

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I enjoyed this a lot, even though I found it somewhat difficult at first -little things that I found irritating, like the detailed description of astrological stuff. Some of those things (not the astrology!) become clearer towards the end. Interestingly, I now feel that some of those little irritating things were there on purpose, somewhat like when we meet a new person that has traits and foibles that make you wary of them or simply not relate (like, say, the astrology). As the book progresses and the main character and the story flesh out, they become complex and interesting, as in the case of those people one might have found irritating at first and end up accepting as friends. So many strands of it -the way someone in her situation will get ignored, talked down or condescended to. The way the grass was greener on the Czech side of the border. The one liners (and the make-believe pop wisdom quips). The characters slowly become believable (at least the main characters, many of the secondary ones remain very roughly drawn). I liked it.

This was the set reading for the Bibliogoth meeting in October 2019.



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The Big Sleep (Philip Marlowe, #1)The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


This was the set reading for September 2019 Bibliogoth. I enjoyed the book, which I'd never read -I'd read (in translation) quite a bit of noir private eye stories when I was a kid but this is kind of seminal. Marlowe's stereotypes pop up everywhere there is a depiction of a private detective -either conforming to the stereotype or riffing on an exaggeration of it (like Josephus Miller in The Expanse) or going against it, as in Columbo. I didn't feel it is a particularly well written book (but then it shares this quality with a lot of stuff by PKD and Lovecraft, for instance), there are some unlikely twists in the plot and most of the characters didn't feel 'real', but rather as simple plot devices to make the story advance. And it is a book of its time in ways that often grate -the casual sexism and homophobia are often shocking. So, entertaining but problematic.



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Sorry I'm Late, I Didn't Want to Come: An Introvert’s Year of Living DangerouslySorry I'm Late, I Didn't Want to Come: An Introvert’s Year of Living Dangerously by Jessica Pan

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


Still reading it, about 85% into it as I write this. What the author has to say is interesting and I can relate to a lot of it but I find the constant pop culture references don't really add to the substance of the book but rather detract from it and make it feel vacuous and ephemeral.



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