Manga Question
Jul. 17th, 2015 10:01 pmDo y'all think I would like Tokyo Ghoul?
Goofy, childish folklore scholar Kantarou Ichinomiya (the English translation uses Western name order) ekes out a living by writing books from his research, but his actual passion is encountering and befriending youkai. In his youth, his ability to see youkai caused him to be shunned by other children, and he became convinced that his problems would all be solved by finding the famous demon-eating tengu (a classic Japanese monster with birdlike characteristics, although the only birdlike thing about the two tengu seen so far in this series are their feathered wings). When Kantarou finds the tengu in the opening chapter of the series, he binds the creature by giving him a name, Haruka. The handsome humanoid becomes part of Kantarou's household, along with a fox youkai woman named Yoko who serves as cook, maid, and menial-of-all-work. She's the one who has to go out and earn them all a living when Kan-chan's slacking off.
The outline of the story sounds roughly like Natsume's Book of Friends, but notice that Kantarou is binding youkai, not releasing them. Also, instead of the touching, lonely little child Natsume that we see in flashbacks in that series, li'l Kan-chan is an absolute parody of a cutesy manga tot, and the English translation has him speak in the kind of twee childish lisp that Dorothy Parker parodied when she said (in her review of The House at Pooh Corner) "Tonstant Weader fwowed up." Kantarou is feckless, bossy, has no sense of boundaries, can't seem to acknowledge that he has enslaved Yoko and Haruka, and does things like drag them off to a hot springs resort (paid for by his editor) and then complain that they still look sulky.
Man, do I want to smack the living shit out of him.
I disliked him rather less on my re-read before writing this, enough so that I ordered the rest of this shounen series secondhand (Tactics was a victim of Tokyopop's demise and ends in official English translation with volume 8). The plot mainly involves Kantarou's investigations of strange phenomena that typically turn out to involve youkai. Sometimes things end relatively happily, but when they don't, Kantarou proves himself a true cousin of Yuuko (xxxHolic) and Count D (Pet Shop of Horrors) in arranging for unpleasant fates for the wicked.
( Cut for more, including some spoilers )
Black Lagoon News!
May. 12th, 2015 11:03 pmOMG, you guys! Volume 10 is out! Why didn't anybody TELL ME?
Partners Shiro Kakei, a mostly closeted and uptight lawyer, and Kenji Yabuki, a genial and talkative hairstylist, live their lives in the pages of this seinen series, interacting with coworkers, neighbors, friends, and relatives as they face a variety of everyday complications and crises. As in Not Love but Delicious Foods Make Me So Happy, Yoshinaga's focus is actually food, but where that good-humored parody of the mangaka's own life emphasized restaurant dining, What Did You Eat focuses on modern Japanese home cooking. After a day at the office, Shiro likes to unwind by preparing dinner for the two of them, narrating his cooking to himself in a way that results in near-complete recipes for the reader. If you are any kind of a cook at all, it's likely you can follow his preparations in your own kitchen (given that you can figure out and obtain some of the convenience ingredients: "noodle sauce," for example, is a common flavor enhancer in his recipes).
Yoshinaga, honored with multiple awards for her beautifully drawn alternate history Ooku: The Inner Chambers, seems to me to be using this series much the way Shiro uses his cooking: a less stressful challenge with which to unwind. The artwork is pretty (although nowhere as elaborate as Ooku's) and the events diverting (although neither as humorous as Not Love nor as poignant as Flower of Life or Antique Bakery), but for me, this series lacks a certain something.
( Cut for more, including some spoilers )
Subaru Sumeragi is the latest head of a respected family of onmyogi (interpreted here as magicians and exorcists). He is also only sixteen years old, and what little of his life that is not devoted to either school or performing exorcisms is essentially run by his twin sister Hokuto, who bosses him around and cooks for him. The twins live on their own in Tokyo, an arrangement that seems particularly unwise in light of the fact that Hokuto believes Subaru should become the lover of their acquaintance Seishirō Sakurazuka, seemingly a mild-mannered veterinarian who happens to be nearly a decade older.
Hokuto, who never seems to wear the same outfit twice (and most of them are pretty extreme), jokes that Seishirō must be a member of the Sumeragi clan's dark rivals, who use their mystical powers in assassinations. Whether he is or not, he does seem to be following along with Hokuto's suggestions with regard to her twin, declaring his love for the innocent Subaru and cuddling up to the boy suggestively. Subaru, meanwhile, has creepy dreams about a youth who tells him that cherry blossoms owe their color to corpses buried beneath them, which does not seem terribly surprising for a sensitive teenaged boy who spends a great deal of his time exorcising the ghosts of suicides.
( Cut for spoilers … )I see that it's been nearly two years since I've done an in-depth review of a manga (the last one was Gunslinger Girls in April 2013). Wah.
That Reading Meme Again - May 15, 2014
May. 15th, 2014 10:04 pmYeah, I seem to be doing this monthly. *sigh*
What have you just finished reading?
Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo. YA fantasy with a Slavic-based setting. The heroine is a prickly, skinny girl who is a cartographer with the army, but she turns out to be The Chosen One and gets swept off for special magical training. She's a duck out of water in a way that reminds me a little of Menolly in the Harper Hall in McCaffrey's Pern books, with the queen bee girls being rude and prickly to her. About midway through she suddenly becomes healthier and prettier because Plot Reasons, and then she starts to like to try on dresses, and I realized that I didn't like her nearly as much. I then had to castigate myself for this, because I'm sure lots of the intended readers would love that part. There was some silly romantical stuff too, which I also disliked. And then Bardugo completely confounded my expectations about what the last part of the book was going to be like. Well done, author! I still don't think it's a great book: too many things happening with too little run-up (for example, Alina's relationship wth her childhood friend Mal would have been better with more showing, less telling, of their shared history), but I think I'm invested enough to get the sequel.
The Snake Stone, by Jason Goodwin, is the second Master Yashim book. I begin to see what ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
flemmings was saying about the hero's sex life. It's annoying because Yashim might as well not be a eunuch, except that it means he can visit the seraglio in the palace. He's starting to read more like a man with a slightly low-ish sex drive instead. The cultural and culinary details remain interesting, and I liked the info about pre-Victorian archeology and book-collecting.
The Little Death by Michael Nava is the first volume of a mystery series about a gay lawyer, Henry Rios. It features a tragic Boyfriend in the Refrigerator and lots of Evil Plotting by the rich and the famous. I like Henry, although his situation is somewhat depressing. I will probably try the next one as well.
Four British Fantasists, which is a critical study and comparison of authors Penelope Lively, Alan Garner, Susan Cooper, and Diana Wynne Jones. The author, Charles Butler, is a member of the DWJ online mailing list. The book was interesting, and now I'm wondering whether I should fill in some of the books that I haven't read that are discussed, especially by Lively and Garner. Although I remember bouncing off Garner's Red Shift, and the things he wrote after that are apparently even more experimental.
What are you currently reading?
Another re-read for a writing challenge, and also volume 10 of the manga Bunny Drop, which basically short stories about Daikichi and Rin that didn't make it into the main series (which ended, plot-wise, with vol. 9).
What do you think you'll read next?
I just got an Amazon order that includes volume 1 of Fumi Yoshinaga's manga series What Did You Eat Yesterday? Also, volume 3 of the hard yaoi manga Crimson Spell (by Ayano Yamane), and the latest volumes of Marjorie Liu's Hunter Kiss series (Labyrinth of Stars) and Ben Aaronovitch's Peter Grant series (Broken Homes). The Aaronovitch has been getting mixed reviews, but I have to at least give it a try because the earlier books were so awesome. (These are both urban fantasy, for those unfamiliar with them, but very different in tone and scope.)
That Reading Meme - April 11, 2014
Apr. 11th, 2014 08:08 amMaybe I can get around to this ... monthly?
What have you just finished reading?
Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein, at last. For a while, it seemed like everyone on my f-list was reccing this. and I got a copy for Hanukah … but kept putting off reading it. It sounded like it was going to be unrelentingly sad, and also, as a Jewish child of the 60s, I was subjected to loads of documentary footage on Holocaust atrocities as part of my religious school curriculum, so I was very reluctant to read a story involving a Nazi prisoner. When I finally did read it. I was actually charmed by some of it, and parts were really quite funny. It is tragic, and simply intensely sad in parts, but it also ends with a sort of calm joy.
The Janissary Tree, by Jason Goodwin, is a charming and yet occasionally gruesome murder mystery set in early 19th century Istanbul, with a eunuch court official as investigator. There is the potential for all sorts of cultural shenanigans (orientalism, obviously, and misrepresentations of Turkish Islamic culture) here, and I don't know enough about any of it to say what kind of course Goidwin has steered. I did enjoy the book and appreciated its representation of a spectrum of human sexuality (although there was definitely a "kill your gays" moment). I did find it rather odd that Goodwin in general represents dialog in other languages by choice of phrase and occasionally non-English vocabulary, but for some reason, uneducated Greeks are given the sort of eye dialect familiar to me from British naturalist Gerald Durrell's Corfu memoirs.
Also, I should note that as ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif){kind=small}
flemmings pointed out to me, this is a great book for foodies. Our hero, Master Yashim, loves good food and cooks as a diversion as well as for nourishment.
Finally, I read the last volume of the manga Fushigi Yûgi: Genbu Kaiden by Yuu Watase, which ended about as could be expected. I was relieved that the young king didn't have a tragic ending. Also, I read volume 4 of CLAMP's Gate 7, which continues to be both pretty and pretty ridiculous, albeit entertainingly so. I understand it is now in hiatus, which rots. WTF, CLAMP publishers? People actually like your sparkly silliness. Don't you want to cash in on that?
What are you currently reading?
I am several chapters into the second Master Yashim mystery, The Snake Stone. I'm also doing a re-read for a story I'm writing.
What do you think you'll read next?
I still need to make myself start the manga Vinland Saga. Also, Fumi Yoshinaga's What Did You Eat Yesterday? has just started coming out in English. I'd read Yoshinaga's adaptation of the DC telephone book (supposing such a thing existed), so I'm definitely going to get this one. I also have a couple of YA novels lying around that I got for the holidays and never read. And who knows, maybe the put-one take-one shelf at work will produce the third Master Yashim mystery (that's where I got the other two).
Guys, I have not done this since November. I will try to get back on track!
What have you just finished reading?
Marie Brennan's (swan_tower's) historical fantasy A Star Shall Fall. I liked it fairly well. I'm not sure what would have made it better for me. I need to think about that. I got this copy from last year's Con or Bust auction, so it's taken me a while to decide to read it.
The latest volume, 9, of the manga Ooku: The Inner Chambers by Fumi Yoshinaga. I really liked it and found it much less grim than this series usually is, so I expect the other shoe to drop and the series to go back to normal - or worse - by next volume. There's a great new character, Hiraga Gennai. I will not spoil you about Gennai and what makes Gennai great. XD
The first two volumes of the manga Thermae Romae, which is awesomely silly and beautifully drawn. (The book production values are spectacular too.) It's about a Roman engineer who keeps being transported off at random intervals to present-day Japan, where he encounters various modern-day Japanese public and private baths and invariably returns with new inspirations to try out in Rome. Some of the inspirations are relatively believable, and some are wonderfully absurd in a Flintstones-cartoon sort of way. (Wait'll you see his shampoo shield and shampoo hose.) His interpretations of what he's seeing in Japan are really funny.
What are you currently reading?
I just started Marjorie Liu's The Fire King, which is one of her Dirk & Steele paranormal romances.
What do you think you'll read next?
I grabbed Jason Godwin's The Janissary Tree from the take-on leave-one collection at work. This is a historical mystery set in the early 19th-century Ottoman Empire. I seem to recall reading a favorable review of it at one point, and it won the Edgar Award in 2007. Also, I have the first two volumes of the manga Vinland Saga, but it looks awfully grim. It may be a while until I can get myself to read it.
What have you just finished reading?
Some more odd serial art stuff from the Small Press Expo, most of which didn't make much of an impression. The one exception was Bread & Wine: An Erotic Tale of New York, by Samuel R. Delaney and Mia Wolff. As most of you probably know, Samuel Delaney was one of the first successful African American science fiction writers. This is an actual, biographical story of how he met his life partner, Dennis, who was a homeless man living on the streets of New York. It's very explicit and frank; in parts it's very sad and in others, it's very tender and joyful.
Also, the latest National Geographic, which had a rather disturbing story of a storm chaser who was recently killed by one of the tornados he was pursuing, along with a colleague and his own adult son, an accomplished photographer.
I am all caught up with the webcomic Yellow Peril. I have made an LJ feed for it, yellowperilcomi. LJ needs longer names for the feeds. :-(
Finally, I read vol. 4 of House of Five Leaves. I think I'm starting to get used to the mangaka's drawing style. However, I can't agree with the comments I've seen online about how wonderful it is.
What are you currently reading?
Still reading Max Gladstone's Three Parts Dead, which is getting really, really good. Things have taken a massive turn for the worse in the story; I'm mentally biting my fingernails.
For some reason, I have also started a re-read of Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm, which I had downloaded onto my phone sometime ago. It's a pleasant enough diversion, except when the author goes off onto a spate of Rebecca-worship.
What do you think you'll read next?
Still haven't started ann_leckie's Ancillary Justice. Also, I've got my Yuletide canon re-read stacked up and ready to go, plus I need to do a canon review for some beta reading.
What have you just finished reading?
Not nearly such a busy reading week as last week!
I think the only things I actually finished reading were the latest volume of Blade of the Immortal (vol. 27), and the first couple of volumes of an indie comic, Tales of the Night Watchman, that the Mr. picked up at Small Press Expo. I was rather underwhelmed by it: just not my thing.
Volume 27: Mist on the Spider's Web was awesome. I should do an entire post on these most recent volumes of Blade of the Immortal sometime. Some people have noted that Rin is not much of a fighter and that Hyakurin and Makie are much more typical female characters, with Hyakurin as the femme fatale spy-type and Makie as the amazingly skilled woman with Major Issues. But then we had Ainu swordswoman Doa, and shinobi Meguro and Tampopo (I thought they were just comic relief at first — Samura's version of C3PO and R2D2 — boy, was I wrong!), and then this current volume had a marvelous arc for Ryo, the kenshi who's the illegitimate daughter of an important man. Even though it turned out badly in the end, she was fantastic.
What are you currently reading?
I have started Max Gladstone's Three Parts Dead, and I am enjoying it, but it's not grabbing me hard the way that the Dirk & Steele books were. I'm also trying to catch up to the current storyline on the webcomic Yellow Peril. With the Mini, I can read webcomics in bed! (Yes, cho, welcome to the 21st century.)
What do you think you'll read next?
I have volume 4 of the manga House of Five Leaves. I should probably blog the series properly after I finish that, since I can usually tell whether I'll continue with a series somewhere around vol. 3 to 5. Also, I bought ann_leckie's Ancillary Justice, which has been getting great reviews.
What have you just finished reading?
Marjorie Liu's Dirk & Steele books are beginning to become like potato chips for me: bet you can't read just one!
On oyceter's rec, I tried Shadow Touch next. Suddenly, for me, Liu has gone from the rather tentative romance author about whom I was "Eh … OK" in Tiger Eye to being very recognizably the author of the Hunter Kiss urban fantasy series (which I have enjoyed very much thus far). I really enjoyed this book, although it was so much harder-edged (particularly in the early scenes in the mysterious research facility) that I got a bit of mental whiplash.
Oyce's other rec was Eye of Heaven. About halfway through it, I suddenly remembered a series of RPG characters I played in my early 20s who were very much like the heroine of this story. Oh yeah! Anyway, the male lead in this book was one of the secondary characters whom I had especially liked in Tiger Eye. There is a lot of complicated Plot Stuff that's building up across the entire series and that is reminiscent of some of the plot elements of the Hunter Kiss series, making me wonder whether subsequent books in Dirk & Steele are going to have transdimensional world hopping and demons too. I'm amused by some of the reviews I'm reading of these: apparently people who like the more typical sorts of romances find these not romantic enough and too violent. Oh well … de gustibus non disputandum est.
I was at Small Press expo for the last 90 minutes of the event the other week, and one of the things I picked up on a blitz through the dealers' room was Back to the Grind, the first collection of Jamie Noguchi's webcomic Yellow Peril. I was attracted initially by the picture of lead character Kane on a recognizable Metro train on the cover and ended up talking to Noguchi, who drew me a cartoon on the inside of the book to go with his autograph. I enjoyed this and will have to catch up on Kane's more recent adventures online.
AND … I finally finished E. Nesbit's The Wouldbegoods! Arrrgggh. Nesbit generally seemed to respect her juvenile characters, but not in this volume. The kids are constantly getting into scrapes that are, to me as an adult, completely transparent. You can see the foolish errors coming from the first couple of paragraphs of any given adventure, and the eventual denouments are equally predictable. Also, I get tired of narrator Oswald's constantly put-downs of the girls in the little gang, and even though tomboyish Alice is usually described more kindly than the others, she still comes in for a lot of criticism and patronization. It's quite different from the children in the Five Children and It and its sequels, where eldest sister Anthea was a valued member of the group and little Jane's pouting and lack of fortitude were attributed to her age more than to her sex.
What are you currently reading?
Fanfiction, mostly. As noted elsewhere, I've been loading a lot of old favorites onto my iPad Mini.
I'm also about halfway through volume 3 of the manga House of Five Leaves. I'm enjoying it to some extent, but the art style is driving me nuts. I'm having a lot of trouble telling about half of the male characters apart, and that means I lose a lot of the impact of the various little criminal episodes and character revelations.
What do you think you'll read next?
I have downloaded Max Gladstone's Three Parts Dead, which I had on my Amazon wish list (I don't remember whose review got me interested) and which was on sale for $2.99, as well as (free) The Count of Monte Cristo, which (shockingly, I suppose) I have never read, and which lady_ganesh recommended. Also, smilaraaq just passed me a steampunk romance to try ... it's by Meljean Brook, whom lawless523 was just recommending the other week.
Legal Drug/Drug and Drop?
Oct. 4th, 2013 07:49 amSo does anyone know of a good place to read the new manga for this online? Does anyone know whether there is a book deal involved?
What have you just finished reading?
Busy week!
C.J. Cherryh's Russalka, which had a more interesting and touching ending than I remember. As is common with Cherryh, I could see ideas and issues that she has tried again or previously in other works, which doesn't bother me: they're interesting ideas.
Also, vol. 8 of Ooku by Fumi Yoshinga. This is still a cool series, and beautifully drawn, but I want more slice-of-life Yoshinaga (like Antique Bakery and Flower of Life) or yaoi Yoshinaga (like Ichigenme … The First Class Is Civil Law). I wonder whether she'll ever go back to her roots that way?
Then I read the first volume of the manga version of Durarara!. My reaction is basically "What the hell was that?" The story thus far has seesawed back and forth between cheery high school comedy and urban dark fantasy. I imagine it will take a couple more volumes before I can even tell whether I like it or not.
Volume 2 of House of Five Leaves was interesting, although the mangaka's distinctive drawing style is beginning to wear on me a little. Although it couldn't be more different in style from Fruits Basket, I'm having the same sort of difficulties telling characters apart.
Finally, I just finished Ashes of Honor by Seanan McGuire, the sixth October Daye book. I really liked it. I think it's partially because it is now definitely an ensemble cast. Given that it's written from Toby's POV, she has to be the center, but she has collected an extended family-of-choice that I very much like. So now there's only one more book available: Chimes at Midnight, which just came out a few weeks ago. And then I'll have to wait for one volume a year, according to her website: three more volumes, coming out 2014 - 2016.
What are you currently reading?
And still limping through The Wouldbegoods by E. Nesbit. I only read bits of it when I have nothing else to read, but I am determined to finish it.
I downloaded the first Marjorie Liu "Dirk & Steele" book, Tiger Eye. It's my first straight paranormal romance (as opposed to Liu's harder-edged urban fantasies about demon hunter Maxine Kiss), and for about the whole first chapter I wanted to thrown it against a wall for what I assume were romanticism elements. As an example, when Our Heroine is retreating through a crowd, and the whole scene has been from her POV, she's suddenly described as getting through the crowd "gracefully." Because, you know, when someone is worried about retreating from potential danger, she of course spends time thinking about how gracefully she does it. (Mary Sue, phone home.) But I'm getting much more interested in it as we get into the heart of the book, including everything from the comedy of trying to make a very tall exotic-looking man inconspicuous in Beijing (and trying to find normal 20th century cosmopolitan clothes to fit him, since he showed up looking like an extra from a Conan story) and the family-of-choice aspects of the firm. And the constantly broken-off almost-sex scenes aren't any more over-the-top than a lot of fanfiction. It's like Liu was really unsure of what she was doing for the first couple of chapters and then got into it more whole-heartedly.
What do you think you'll read next?
Uhhh … another problem for another day. I do have two novels in hand that I got off the bring one-take one shelf at work, but I'm not itching to start either one: Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer and The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern, which was recommended by a colleague. Anyone have opinions on either of them?
What have you just finished reading?
Volume 4 of the manga Bunny Drop (re-read) and the omnibus volume 5 of Gunslinger Girls, where the mangaka is working overtime to stomp on our hearts and smash those suckers flat. (Have I mentioned that the latter series is shounen by its magazine classification? That seems weird to me. Although I am glad that young teen boys are being exposed to the concept of tough, adventurous girls, even if they are brainwashed cyborgs.)
What are you currently reading?
Still Limping through The Wouldbegoods by E. Nesbit and nibbling away at C.J. Cherryh's Russalka. Also some re-reading for a writing project. Plus, I have started vol. 3 of the manga A Bride's Story.
What do you think you'll read next?
Volume 2 of House of Five Leaves. volume 8 of Ooku by Fumi Yoshinaga, and volume 1 of Durarara! are in the pipeline from Amazon, along with Ashes of Honor (vol. 6 of Seanan McGuire's October Daye series).
It's been three weeks since I did this. I'm not going to list everything I've read since then!
What have you just finished reading?
Nail Gaiman's The Ocean at the End of the Lane. I enjoyed it; it was a comfortable fit for me. Even the scary parts were comfortable somehow: Gaiman has a real feel for what actually scares kids. The reviewers have been mostly talking this up like it's the second coming of goodness-knows-what. I think it's an effective piece of writing and in some places, very beautiful, but it isn't wrapping around my brain like, say, American Gods. On the other hand, I liked it better than Coraline or The Graveyard Book. It also reminded me in some ways of Jo Walton's Among Others, in that it's a tribute to the place that books create for introverted children.
I also read volume 1 of The House of Five Leaves, a manga that had been recommended by smillaraaq and that had caught my eye on the Viz site a while back. I liked it and wanted more.
I'm re-reading the first several volumes of the manga Bunny Drop (note: spoilers in the post at the link), probably because last week I read the final volume. All my series seem to have run out. *is sad* Anyway, I've finished re-reading volumes 1 through 3.
I also just finished Jim Hines' Codex Born, which was a total page-turner for me. I also really liked the way Lena's character developed. I think this is the book where I can officially say that I am a Hines fan. I was very underwhelmed by The Stepsister Scheme, and although Libriomancer was fun, it didn't grab me the way this most recent book did.
What are you currently reading?
Limping through The Wouldbegoods by E. Nesbit, which I don't dislike enough to quit entirely. Also re-reading volume 4 of Bunny Drop and C.J. Cherryh's Russalka, which I first read years ago, and which I have downloaded to my new tablet from the author's Closed Circle site.
What do you think you'll read next?
Hmmm, I really don't know! Someone on the f-list was reviewing some private investigator mysteries with gay protagonists (this author and this one); maybe I'll try one of those.
What have you just finished reading?
Seanan McGuire's Late Eclipses and One Salt Sea (vols. 4 and 5 of the October Daye series), vols. 1 and 2 of the manga A Bride's Story, and vols. 1 and 2 of the manga adaptation of the anime Tiger & Bunny.
I liked One Salt Sea better than Late Eclipses, because in the latter, Toby is back to doing impulsive stupid things that have me going "Um, no, Toby, don't do that," with the result that I knew roughly what was happening about halfway through the book. In One Salt Sea, I knew to some degree whodunnit, but not how, and it was interesting to see it play out. There were also a couple of very funny scenes.
(On the other hand, I continue to twitch from time to time and wonder what happened to the Native American spirits in this completely Euro-fae-occupied America.)
A Bride's Story is just beautiful, and I liked Amir's feistiness and mad hunting skillz. On the other hand, there's almost no exploration of how it feels to be a 20-yr-old woman married to a 12-yr-old boy.
Tiger & Bunny was cute, but after two volumes, the underlying emotional arcs are only just getting started.
What are you currently reading?
Emilie and the Hollow World by Martha Wells, and The Treasure Seekers by E. Nesbit. I am enjoying them very much.
What do you think you'll read next?
I have Throne of the Crescent Moon queued up, and also some re-reading for another writing exchange.
What have you just finished reading?
Noel Streatfeild's Dancing Shoes and a Montreal travel guide.
What are you currently reading?
Peter Dickinson's The Blue Hawk, which I have almost finished (another re-read). I had forgotten how much I enjoyed that one! Really lovely use of language, and some interesting meditations on the nature of gods and those who worship them. Some of it echoes the points made in both Pratchett's Small Gods (1992) and Hodgell's God Stalk (1986) ... Dickinson's book was published in 1991, so make of that what you will. I'm also making my way through some manga re-reading for a writing project.
What do you think you'll read next?
I just downloaded the first two of E. Nesbit's "Bastables" series, which I have never read. I am very fond of her series featuring the Psammead, so we shall see. I'm also about to do a big book order for vacation reading, and I'll probably add on the next volumes of Natsume's Book of Friends and Black Butler, both of which came out recently.
(To my intense disgust, Ben Aaronovitch's next book is due out in the U.K. tomorrow ... but not due in the U.S. until 2014!)
What have you just finished reading?
Rilla of Ingleside by L.M. Montgomery and Thursday's Children by Rumer Godden.
Rilla of Ingleside has, in some ways, more depths than the rest of the series, because Canada goes through WWI during the time of the novel. Young men go off to war, and several of the young women go off to volunteer support work as well. Rilla, who is a rather silly, spoiled little girl at the start of the novel, ends up keeping the home fires burning and also taking care of an almost-orphan baby: his father is off in the war and his mother has died. Rilla ends up (with her family's support) bringing him up "by the book." It's interesting to see an early take on this: she's worried about germs and so on, yet at one point (strikingly similar to the scene in the first book where Anne saves Diana's little sister's life), the child's life is saved by a rather bizarre old-style medical treatment. The book's final scene happens rather abruptly – almost an afterthought – but the last line is a killer! XD
The Godden book was a comfort reread, and I skipped some scenes in the first part, because they make me too sad (and that's saying something: there are a lot of sad scenes in the book). Doone and Crystal Penny are the youngest children of a grocer and his wife, a former chorine. Ma is devoted to the idea of making Crystal into the ballerina she herself always yearned to be, but she has no concept of the serious, hard-working side of ballet training and spoils Crystal abominably. Doone, an unwanted afterthought baby, is enchanted with dance and music and shows real talent at both, but between Ma's focus on Crystal and Pa's conviction that ballet is only for girls and queers, he has a really tough row to hoe. It all comes right in the end, not only for Doone, but also for Crystal: as horrid and spoiled as she is, she's also been mistreated by her family, and she needs to go through emotional fire to earn her happy ending. This book always strikes me as "Rumer Godden writes Noel Streatfeild," and it has the strengths of both authors.
What are you currently reading?
More non-fiction and also some fiction for story research, plus Wild Adapter vol. 4 (re-read). Volumes 4 (where Kubota gets taken into police custody after being observed at a crime scene) and 5 (the flashback to where Kubota finds Tokito, narrated by their young neighbor Shouta) are my favorites in this series. Not coincidentally, they also have the most scenes with my favorite supporting characters: Detective Kasai (who is Kubota's uncle), Dr. Kou, Anna, Takizawa the reporter (now a freelance journalist), and Shouta himself.
What do you think you'll read next?
I have downloaded Little Fuzzy to my phone. I am also going to be reading a tour book or two for our upcoming vacation.
What have you just finished reading?
The Shadowed Sun by N. K. Jemisin (re-read) and Anne of Avonlea by L.M. Montgomery.
I need to write up the Jemison properly.
I read and re-read Anne of Green Gables as a child, but I never got any of the sequels. They're all available for free online (I got mine from FeedBooks). Anne of Avonlea covers the time from Anne's receipt of her teaching certificate at Queen's Academy (you may recall that she went away from home to earn this) through a couple of years of teaching grade school.
One of the most striking thing about the book for me was how much the unequal treatment of the little Keith twins bothered me. Montgomery's interest is all too clearly only in mischievous Davy; well-behaved Dora is a piece of cardboard who gets only parts of a couple of scenes. The same thing is true to a somewhat lesser extent with Anne's school pupils: imaginative, attractive young Paul Irving is the only child who counts. I'm not sure why this irked me so much, but it did.
What are you currently reading?
Seanan McGuire's An Artificial Night (October Daye #3) and Anne of the Island by L.M. Montgomery (I've actually nearly finished this).
What do you think you'll read next?
I need to at least start Richard K. Morgan's The Steel Remains. I've ordered the manga volume Loveless 11 online and hope to have it by Friday, and I imagine I'll download the next "Anne" book (Wikipedia tells me that this is Anne of Windy Poplars).
What have you just finished reading?
Gunslinger Girl manga, omnibus vol. 4 (vols. 9 & 10 of the original) and my Sutcliff re-read. Re GG: Aiiiee, so sad. T-T
What are you currently reading?
The Shadowed Sun by N. K. Jemisin (re-read) and Anne of Avonlea by L.M. Montgomery, which I downloaded for free on my phone (I got the free version of the Aldiko reader).
What do you think you'll read next?
I just obtained Seanan McGuire's An Artificial Night (Toby Daye #3) and Richard K. Morgan's The Steel Remains. If the latter sounds out of character, that's because it's the choice of a summer book club thing I'm doing.
