Divinenanny's 100+ of 2012

I surpassed the 100 books again last year (153 was my final total) but I want to stay here. This year my plan is to read again around 150 books, but at least 100 books.

My goals:
To read more of the shelf, buy less (I bought so much in 2011 this might be doable this year).
Read more award-winners, especially Hugo, Nebula, Locus and Booker.
Read from the 1001 books to read before you die list (2008 edition)
Don't forget to read non-sci-fi/fantasy.
Read non-fiction
Read some new series (Malazan, Thomas Covenant, Discworld and Ringworld).
Reread some well loved books (Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, Anathem, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy).
Read The Hobbit before the movie comes out.

My TBR pile as of 1/1/2012:
I have 363 in my house that I still want to read. I have 458 books that were bought for me to read, but 95 of those aren't quite my taste (anymore). Let's see if I will add to this number or manage to make a dent...

My counter:

Great to see you again! And I'm looking forward to your book recommendations, you've always got some good ones!

Gosh, I haven't even read Anathem for a first time!!

Looking forward to watching your thread again! Happy reading!

Got you starred, looking forward to more great reviews.

Welcome back!

Thanks all! Well, let's kick off the new year, here is my first review of 2012!



Book #1: Dubbelster/Double Star by Robert A. Heinlein (01-01-2012 / 02-01-2012)
In an effort to read more award-winning books, and even more (classic) science fiction, I picked Double Star by Robert Heinlein as my first read of 2012. It is the oldest unread Hugo winner I own, and even though I have 8 books by Heinlein on my shelves (or in boxes, because the shelves are overflowing), I had never read anything by Heinlein.
This is the story of Lorenzo, an actor. It is the future, and mankind has met the Martians, Venetians and other aliens. We have colonies on the moon and live and travel to the planets. There is one great human empire, ruled by the figure-head Emperor Willem (yes, of Orange, great to see our royal house do so well in the future). Lorenzo is contacted to do the acting job of his life, which leads him to a nest of Martians (who he can't stand) and to a meeting with the emperor himself.
The book was written in the fifties, and in some ways shows its age. The only woman is an in-love-with-her-boss secretary, and computers are nowhere to be found (slide rules are still going strong). And except for aliens and space travel, the book isn't really science fiction. It is more about politics and could have taken place on earth, where the aliens are people from a different culture. But all this doesn't matter if you keep it in mind. It is a very enjoyable novel, short but good. Four out of five stars.

Wow, one down already! Happy new year and here's to a fine year of reading ahead! I'm looking forward to your reviews.

Let's have a look back to 2011:

In 2011 my reading goal was to read 100 books. In 2010, I read 132, so 100 books should be do-able. And it was, because last year I read 153 books, I finished the last one on the morning of December 31st. In this post I want to share some of my nerdy reading stats. For the first time I did some serious tracking of my reading, not only making a list, but also tracking the number of pages, language, kind of book, ratings etc. I also entered the data for 2010, 2009 and 2008 to make comparisons possible. I know, I am a nerd. But now I do have these nice stats :D.


The first table shows how many books I read each year. A slight dip in September, because I had the whole month off from work and we were on vacation. Strange, I know, but since I do my reading on my commute to and from work, I always read less when I don't have to work. Same thing goes for December.


The books I read in 2011 were pretty good, no 1 or 2 stars. This is partly because I abandoned one book I really couldn't stand Night Train to Lisbon, and I took some more care in selecting the books I read. I tried to evaluate each book for what it was meant to be, so a young adult novel, while nowhere near as brilliant as a Haruki Murakami book, can also be four stars, because it is a good YA novel.


This graph shows the total number of books I read each month in the past four years. 2011 was pretty similar to 2010 (I also had my holiday in September then). The last two years I have been reading more and more, and you can see that here.


This is the total number of books I read the last few years, reading more and more each year. However, I think +/-150 books a year is my max. I read towards my goal of 100, which I surpassed. However, I read some pretty big books of 1000+ pages, and read without pressure. I know myself, and I know if I set the goal of 175 for next year, I won't pick up those big novels as easily. So 100 will remain my goal, and everything else is a bonus.


This graph shows the total number of books read at the end of each month. This shows that in the beginning of 2011 I read a bit less than in 2010, and then I read more and more. The previous years, 2009 and 2008 lag far behind.


But what does reading lots of books say if they are all 50 pages? So I also tracked the number of pages I read each year, to see if I really did read more. And I did. I was surprised to see that even though I only read 31 more books in 2011, I read 18000 more pages. That is insane. Just insane.


I also track the language of the books I read each year. Blue is Dutch (my mother tongue), green is English, yellow is German. I used to read almost only English books, because the books popular in England and written by British and American writers appeal more to me. But in 2011 I couldn't buy books as I used to, and had to save money. So I became a member of the public library, and I also bought a lot of second-hand books. And these were mostly in Dutch, translations from English. I'd rather read the English version, but if I have to choose between a price of €0,50 for the Dutch version or €10,00 for the English one, I know which one I'll pick. I sometimes read German (not in 2011) when a book is published by one of my favorite writers, John Ajvide Lindqvist. He is a Swedish writer, and most of the time his books are translated in German first.


The last graph shows the kind of books I have read, fiction (blue), non-fiction (green) and graphic (yellow). In 2011 it was mostly fiction, and some non-fiction (mostly history books).

WOW. Love the graphs! The nerd in me wants to know what you used to graph your stats. Excel, or another package?

Oh wow! This graphs are amazing and so much info about your reading. The simple bar graph which shows how your reading has grown since 2008 is really telling - what changed that made you read so much more?

Thanks for the compliments :D

#9, Wookiebender, I used Numbers. I made the spreadsheet late one night on my iPad, and mostly use it on my iPad to track stuff. I have one big table per year containing title, author, date started, date finished, rating, language, type and ownership. From that table other tables are populated in one big totals tab for all the graphs.

#10, KiwiNyx, 2008 was the year I graduated :D. I started my current job, with a commute of around 3 hours per day in 2008, and in June 2008 I could finally read for pleasure in my spare time (as opposed to writing a thesis...). The rise last year is probably due to the fact that my fiancee works pretty far away, so he doesn't sleep at home during the week. I hate it, so I usually turn in early and read the evening away.

Yeah, I do most of my reading while commuting, or when Don's working nights. :) Thanks for the hint about Numbers, I've wishlisted it over at the iStore.

Wow! Awesome stats and graphs. I think I have been inspired to do some additional book-keeping for my reading this year!

This sort of data analysis makes me so happy. Nice!

I love how LT brings people together that enjoy nerdy stats and graphs and books as much as I do :D

Book #2: Spin by Robert Charles Wilson (02-01-2012 / 03-01-2012)
I have had this book, a Hugo winner, on my shelf for over a year now, and now that I have read it, I wish I had read it sooner. It is a wonderful science fiction story, which has two sequels already which I can't wait to get and read.
It is the day after tomorrow, and all the stars disappear. Soon it is discovered that the Earth is encapsulated in a shield that keeps out everything, starlight, moonlight, sunlight. An artificial sun keeps the Earth alive. In the book we follow the twins Jason and Diane Lawton, and their friend Tyler through their lives. They are teenagers when the shield appears. Jason, who is smart and being groomed as an heir to his father's business, and who makes solving the shield his only job in life, Diane who loses herself when the shield appears, and Tyler, the son of their housekeeper who will be a doctor and Jason's closest confidant. Over the next thirty years the world, mostly through Jason, tries to figure out what is going on and how to solve it. One of the first things they figure out is that time outside of the shield moves a lot faster than inside. Soon Earth won't be habitable anymore, despite the shield.
I loved everything about this book. The story of the three main characters and how each deals with the shield differently. The story of what the shield is, who installed it and what it is for. The story of what happens when time moves a lot faster in space than on Earth. It all integrates great in the book, which tells the story chronologically, with chapters of the far future spliced in between. Even though the future is pretty bleak, the story never got very depressing, there is always hope. A very deserving Hugo winner, five out of five stars.

Echoing the love of the stats, I find that kind of thing fascinating and luckily for me LT has has made that kind easy to collect.

Thanks for the review of Spin, will read that one, also thanks for the spreadsheet idea, I'll use that, and the groovy graphs !

Love the graphs. I'll have to play with Numbers--I've already got a spreadsheet--but can I come to you for advice?

Hi, Sara! Impressive, the graphs. You're much more ambitious than me, that's for sure!

Thanks all for the compliments. And of course you can always ask Roni, I'll be happy to try and help.
And Bryan, you know, Spin is what I wanted Stephen King's Under the Dome to be.

Awesome review, for some reason I have heard things about this one, now I know it's a must read.

Book #3: The Book of Things by John Connolly (03-01-2012 / 05-01-2012)
I was attracted to this book by the beautiful cover of paper cut-outs. It is the story of a boy who loses his mother and loses himself in his books, all during World War II. It takes inspiration from a lot of other books, which is why it was a bit disappointing.
David, living in 1930s London, loses his mother to an unidentified sickness, leading to a slow death. His father does the best he can to take care of David. David loses himself in the books he and his mother read together, fairy tales. Meanwhile, his father enters a relationship with Rose, a hospice nurse he met while his wife was there. They marry, and get a baby, and the family moves out of London to a big old house in the country. David doesn't know what to do with his feelings of loss, and what to think of Rose and Georgie, his new brother. He starts hearing his books talk, and hears about Rose's lost uncle, who went missing and was never heard from again. He sees The Crooked Man in his world, in his bedroom and garden, and after a big fight, he follows him through a hole in a garden wall, into the other world. A world where fairy tales are grotesquely real.
The whole story sounds pretty familiar, The Chronicles of Narnia immediately spring to mind. Other fantasy/fairy tale standards also are present, the most obvious being the journey through the Other World in which David grows from a boy to a man. The reviews say it is a pretty uneven book, childish/childlike in some parts, and adult and dark in others. This is true, and maybe that is why I am not quite sure what to think. I want to like it, but I have read much better books... Three out of five stars.

Oh dear, I have that one on my shelves somewhere already. I hope I like it more than you did!

Mmm...data. *crunch, crunch*

Can't wait to see what this year's will taste look like. :)

oooooh, I'm drooling over those graphs. Wish I was cleverer!!!

The cover is great isn't it? I can't really remember the The Book of Lost Things but I remember thinking it was ok, I think I really liked the character of David.

Great cover but it doesn't sound like the book delivers as it maybe could. Good review, I like to be warned about books like this.

I have The Book of Lost Things on my tbr pile here as well--what wookie said.

#25, Hahaha, best response ever!
#26, I'd like to say they are easy to make, but it took me a bit of fiddling and figuring out formulas, so it isn't really easy...
#24, 28, 29. I always feel so responsible when you guys take my reviews so seriously, I hope I am right. All I can say that this is what I thought about the book right now, with the mood I am in, and the books I read just before...

Book #4: Duin/Dune by Frank Herbert (08-01-2012 / 10-01-2012)
This is one of the books from my father's collection. I have had it on my shelves a couple of years now, but now, with my new reading resolution to read more award winners, I had to read it. The book was originally published in 1965, my edition is the Dutch translation from 1978.
The story is that of the Atreides family, a noble family living in the galaxy. It is 20.000 years in the future, and while mankind lives among the stars on strange planets, the society is strangely backwards. Computers and robots have been outlawed, instead the society has mentats, humans trained as computer replacements, The Guild takes care of mathematics, and the order of the Bene Gesserit who try to control the mankind by long (loooong) term breeding projects. The galaxy is ruled by an emperor, has many noble families, a guild and the landsraad all influencing politics and daily life. Anyway, the Atreides are lured in a trap by the Harkonnen family and given the planet Dune or Arrakis to rule. From Arrakis comes the spice/melange, essential for life everywhere, very expensive, hard to get and addictive. The Atreides try to survive the trap. Meanwhile, several prophecies and plans come to head with Paul Atreides, the son of the Duke, who turns out to be a lot more special and powerful than everybody thought.
When reading Dune I kept being reminded of the science fiction of Iain M. Banks. The book isn't science fiction in the sense of technology. Yeah the people travel through space, but have no robots, computers, technology, longevity etc. Daily life itself is very backward, with nobles and an emperor and without democracy or equality. Banks has some books like that, more focussed on the story and how it comes together than trying to impress the readers with what he thinks of the future. Dune hardly shows its age (excluding robots and computers was a smart move) and is a very good story still. Five out of five stars.

I have read Dune a couple of times and it always holds up well. Having said that I am never ever tempted to read any of the sequels!

If you don't read the sequels, you're missing out on the best parts of the story. The later books are better written, and the stor yexpands greatly in scope. Just avoid anything written by Brian Herbert & Kevin J Anderson.

I'm way past overdue for a Dune series re-read, but if my faltering memory serves correctly didn't things start going downhill after the 3rd book or so?

On the contrary. God Emperor of Dune is a bit of an acquired taste, I admit, but the last two books Heretics of Dune and Chapterhouse Dune are arguably better-written books than Dune itself.

Your wish is my command :-)



Book #5: Duin Messias/Dune Messiah by Frank Herbert (11-01-2012)
After loving Dune I couldn't help myself and I went right to the second part in the Dune series, Dune Messiah. It's twelve years after the ending of Dune. The jihad of the Fremen is raging through the universe, leaving billions death and the Guild and Bene Gesserit are noticeably less influential than they used to be. I can't say much more about the plot without spoiling the first book, but the main issue is a plot to kill Paul and return the Guild and the Bene Gesserit to their former greatness.
This book is so much more philosophical than the last one, which makes me think that I may need to read this again in a couple of years. It is a great continuation of the previous story, expanding the story and the universe. A great sequel, four out of five stars.

Oh no, more books to read! We do have Dune around here somewhere.. Thanks for the great reviews.

There is this bookstore here in The Netherlands, The American Book Centre (they sell US/UK editions, all English only). They reward those who write content (reviews etc.) for their blog with nice €7,50 vouchers which I just have to spend right away, also using my 10% discount pass :D. Two weeks ago I got a nice sewing books (Sew Serendipity Bags) and today I when I went to spend my latest voucher they had discounted many books, and I picked up The Book of Bags (more bags to sew!) and Queen Victoria: Demon Hunter (I couldn't resist at that price!). Fun fun fun!

Oh, my gods. I want it!

Always knew Queen Victoria would get along well with Buffy. ;)

Weighing in (late) on the Dune discussion, I've read the first few - I got through God Emperor of Dune, but that killed me for the rest of the series, or any re-reads. I did love the first one when I first read it, but my reaction to the later ones did overshadow any willingness I had to re-read. I should probably give a re-read a go soonish, and see how much further I get this time!

@38 I bought Queen Victoria: Demon Hunter as a birthday present based on the brilliant cover alone!

Book #6: The Blade Itself by Joe Abercrombie (12-01-2012 / 17-01-2012)
This is one of those books that I have seen recommended by employees at some of the book stores I often go to. In my resolution for 2012 to start more good series, this is one, part one of the The First Law series by Joe Abercrombie.
It is the story of Logen, fighter from the North. Of Bayaz, First of the Magi. Of Jezal, lazy nobleman. Of Glokta, tortured torturer for the inquisition. All live in a world where the Union is under threat of war from the North and South, and under threat of corruption and laziness from inside the country itself. The land has known magic, but that was a long time ago, and few people believe that the stories about the First of the Magi and the Maker are more than myths. The story follows the different characters chapter by chapter, watching them all come together in the end.
The story reminded me a lot of A Song of Ice and Fire by George R. R. Martin, because of the different characters that are being followed, the political intrigue, the thread of supernatural beings, the violence... The book was clearly a part one, setting up the characters, gathering the group (I want to say fellowship here, although I am not sure about this group's goal). When the book ends, the story continues. It is not necessarily a bad thing, but it does make me wish I already had book two on my shelves to read next. Anyway, another great fantasy story without too many fantasy (some magic, no dragons or elves) and intrigue. Four out of five stars.

Book #7: Old Man's War by John Scalzi (17-01-2012 / 18-01-2012)
Another classic (yet not very old) science fiction story, pretty fast paced and full of speculative science about space travel.
John Perry is 75 years old. His wife has died, and he does what many 75-year-olds do in the USA in the future; he sign up for the army. No regular army though, the Colonial Defense Forces, those forces that protect the human colonists out in space, who only take senior-citizens as recruits. Nobody knows what happens when they leave, all they know is that they are dead to earth, and they assume that their bodies will be fixed up, otherwise, why would take on old people with all their pains and aches? When John arrives in space he finds out what they really do, and what he really signed up for.
The story moves pretty fast, covering some essential scenes told by John Perry himself. Through his stories we learn about the earth as it is in the future. About human colonization in space. About medical and technical advances. About aliens, and about future warfare. It never goes really in depth, and maybe some parts could have been longer, but it is a really fun read, very nice science fiction. Four out of five stars.

Book #8: Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs (18-01-2012 / 19-01-2012)
Ever since I saw this book, and saw the beautiful pictures in it, I just had to have it. I couldn't find it anywhere during our trip to England last year, so when I was ordering some books online I just had to include this book. Just looking at it is great. A gorgeous hardcover, red under the dust cover, filled with gorgeous page-filling old black-and-white photographs that are just a bit eerie. All it is missing is a reading ribbon.
It is the story of Jacob. He loves his grandfather, Abe, who tells amazing stories about the orphanage in Wales where he lived in his youth, just before World War II. He shows Jacob photographs of the amazing children he lived with, children who are peculiar. A girl that floats. An invisible boy. A strong girl. And many more. Jacob enjoys the stories until he grows too old to believe them. But when his grandfather suddenly dies, and Jacob is dealing with the loss, Jacob goes to Wales to find out the truth about his grandfather's past. And his life, and how he sees the world, is never the same again.
Like the previous books I just read, this book is written as a part one of a series, and it shows. It introduces us to this version of earth where peculiar children live. There is a big adventure, but it ends on a cliffhanger. But, all in all, that is the only downside to this wonderful book. The characters, especially the children, are great and magical. The world created is (at least to me) original to me. I cannot wait for the next part, and I hope it will be as beautiful as this one. Four out of five stars.

Oh yeah, and I received that book yesterday, with some other treasures: Doodle Stitching: The Motif Collection and a travel guide to Japan.

Peculiar Children was one of the best books I've read in a long time. I gave it a full five stars. I'm also looking forward to the next book(s), but part of me is worried this might turn into a Potteresque scenario. Our store couldn't possibly stock enough coffee to get me through that again.

Anyway, wasn't the writing fantastic, too? I fell in love with the narrative...clever, and with a hint of cynicism. I could open the book to any page and enjoy rereading a snippet or two.

And the photographs...just too cool. From what I understand, though, the author faced some criticism for incorporating them into the book. Unbelievable!

Oh, I loved Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children; amazingly imagined. What's the story on the Japan guidebook? That's the edition and brand that I took on my recent trip.

And I'll chime in on the third book on your pile, what cute designs! Not that I do embroidery, but I'd be tempted to start if I had that book. :)

I keep resisting Miss Peregrine, but I think I might just like/love it...

I have it on my wishlist--just haven't gotten around to acquiring it yet from the library. But I'm concerned about that cliffhanger...

-46, allthesepieces, I loved the writing and the photographs, and how well they go together. How can anyone complain about the photos? Except maybe that one of the schoolbus driver... The other were lovely and complemented the story so well.

-47, ravenous.reader, I am getting married in March (yay!) and we leave two days later on a three week trip to Japan, travelling through the country from Nagasaki to Tokyo. Do you have any tips?

-48, wookiebender, all the time I see cute embroidery on the craft blogs I read and books like this. I just have to try it. On bags, gadget sleeves, coats.... I get so many ideas :)

-49, ronincats, the book is good in and of itself, but the story end on a "to be continued" note. It is not a 'will he live or will he die' type cliffhanger, it's a part of the story that just isn't finished, ready for fase two. I loved it anyway, and will just keep an eye out for part two when it comes...

Hooray I good review for Miss Peregrine, I have it on my tbr and I keep seeing mixed reviews.

Congratulations on the upcoming wedding!! Great news, and I'm green with envy over Japan as a honeymoon destination.

Oh I didn't spot the wedding news, congrats!

My Japanese two cents are, Osaka for the chaotic bright lights and frenetic night life, Hiroshima (but then maybe not appropriate for a honeymoon) but nearby Miyajima is very beautiful. Oh and Kyoto. Wasn't too much of fan a of Tokyo, just a big city but many shops and museums. You must throw caution to wind and go for a spa (usually split by sexes but then no clothes!). Oh and for an interesting experience overnight in a Buddhist monastery.

Yes, congrats! You'll have to tell us about Japan when you get home. Take lots of pictures!

Thanks for the Miss peregrine review, it's on my TBR mountain !

Thanks clfisha, wookiebender and allthesepieces :D.

#52: Wookiebender, Japan as a honeymoon destination was just about the only thing we knew for sure about our wedding. We have been looking forward to it for years (and saving up for it too). It was also the first thing we had booked, even before booking the wedding (at city hall) itself.

#53: Clfisha, we are going to Osaka for a day (arriving in the morning and leaving the following morning), and are planning to visit the aquarium and castle at least. We aren't planning on Hiroshima (mainly because it would be an extra day, and we are already going to see the bomb memorial in Nagasaki). We might visit Miyajima on our way from Nagasaki to Kyoto, but we aren't sleeping anywhere close by. We are going to Kyoto for three days, and Tokyo for five. But in our Tokyo time is also a day trip to Nikko and a day trip to Hakone. I love (LOVE) big cities, and shopping, and there are a bunch of museum we want to see in Tokyo, that's why we planned five days there at the end of our trip. We are sleeping in a Buddhist monastery on Mount Koya, should be very cool :D. Thanks for the tips!

#54: Allthesepieces, we are taking two cameras and a video camera :D

Book #9: Queen Victoria: Demon Hunter by A. E. Moorat (19-01-2012 / 22-01-2012)
Ever since Pride, Prejudice and Zombies was released a couple of years ago, many books in the {standard work} + {horror element} formula were released. We have Sense, Sensibility and Sea-monsters, Android Karenina, Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter and many more. I have enjoyed every book in this genre, they are just good fun to read. So when I found Queen Victoria: Demon Hunter with this great cover for a couple of euros I just couldn't resist.
This book tells the story of Queen Victoria, from just before her becoming queen, to just after the birth of her second child. It stays true to most facts of her life, such as the strained relationship between her and her mother on account of her mother's comptroller, Sir John Conroy. Other real people who appear are of course Prince Albert, Lord Melbourne, King Leopold, Baroness Lehzen and Lady Hastings. However, everything is seen in a whole new light with the addition of demons walking the earth, and the descendants of Baal trying to gain power to rule the world.
A. E. Moorat does a really good job weaving in the demons with history. An example is the scandal of Lady Flora Hastings, who was allegedly pregnant with Sir John Conroy's baby. In reality it turned out to be liver cancer, in the book... something else. Queen Victoria kicks ass and is everything as powerful, ethical and royal as I expected (and wanted) her to be. All in all a very fun read, very well done. Four out of five stars.

Oh wow, your Japan trip sounds awesome!

And I'm now wishing I hadn't resisted Queen Victoria: Demon Hunter when I saw it at the bookshop last (?) year, but I was feeling a bit jaded with the public domain work + horror element genre. (After reading only one book in this sub-genre, too!)

#58, wookiebender. This one is slightly different, as it is a biography + horror elements. I guess the one about Abraham Lincoln and the one about Henry VIII are more similar to this one too. But you are right, it is an acquired taste...

I hadn't heard of the Henry VIII one! I've heard good things about Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter, if I see it second hand, I'll probably be unable to resist. :)

@56 Sounds fabulous! Mount Koya is where I stayed, with it's fantastic atmospheric graveyard surrounding the holy site, amazing place. The highlights of Miyijima can be done in a day maybe hassle to get to though. The aquarium when I went was scarily deserted (it was cold) and has one of the largest ferrisnwheels next to it (terrifying!). Right going to shut up now ;)

@57 great review I must get it back off my friend!

Congrats on the upcoming nuptials! The trip sounds amazing. Definitely don't miss Gion, the historic district of Kyoto. One of our favorite memories is of this place that let you make your own chopsticks. So much fun. The chopsticks are dipped and redipped in different layers of colored enamel; you gently touch the chopstick to a spinning blade that then reveals the various colors. Gion is gorgeous--to make a rather lowbrow comparison, it looks just like the scenery from Memoirs of a Geisha--all those wooden houses so close together, very narrow winding cobblestone streets, vendors standing in front of stores. Jealous!

Book #10: Tiger! Tiger!/The Stars My Destination by Alfred Bester (22-01-2012 / 23-01-2012)
After reading The Demolished Man last week, I put Alfred Bester on my list of must read science fiction writers, so when I saw Tiger! Tiger! (or, The Stars My Destination), I just had to get it. And I wasn't disappointed.
This is the story of Gully Foyle, a nobody living in a future where mankind has learned to jaunte, or teleport. Teleportation is only possible on the planet, for a maximum of 1000 miles, if you know the exact location and look of the place you are leaving and going to. The discovery of this technique has changed the world, relationships, communication, trade and wealth so much that a war has started between the inner planets (Venus, Terra and Mars) and the outer satellites (moons of Jupiter, Saturn and Neptune). In all this Gully is trapped in the wreckage of the spaceship Nomad, trapped in a supply closet, trying to survive, which he has been able to do in great danger for the last six months. When he finally gets out he is a changed man, a man on a mission. He and his mission are set to change the future of the galaxy forever.
This book was one of those classic science fiction stories I love. It tries to imagine the future, and does a pretty good job. Jaunting means that mankind finds no need for technical tools for communication, everybody tells everything in person. Space travel is easy and possible. It also philosophizes about the consequences of all this, and the new developments because of Gully. A great story, with the only draw back being that it should have been longer. Four out of five stars.

#62, ravenous.reader, I believe we are actually staying at Gion (we are sleeping at an old Geisha's house). Anyway, Gion sounds great and we are definitely going there. Do you have more details about the chopsticks-making place? That sounds like something we'd love to do (and have)...

Book #11: Stad onder de sterren/The City and the Stars by Arthur C. Clarke (23-01-2012 / 25-01-2012)
Another classic science fiction story, this one from my dad's collection. Even though I have only read 2001: A Space Odyssey by Arthur C. Clarke before, he is already on my list of science fiction writers I like and want to read more from.
This is the story of Diaspar, a city on Earth a billion years into the future. The city is huge and completely self-containing, in fact, the rest of Earth is nothing but a desert. The people in Diaspar live completely reliant on the Central Computer. Everything in the city, including furniture and food is created on the fly by this computer from patterns stored in its vast memory-banks. The people live a thousand years, after which they are stored in the memory-banks to be reborn in the future. The people have an immense fear of outside Diaspar, because of the threat of the invaders which drove humanity into Diaspar, and leaves them alone on the condition they never venture out again. In this city, Alvin is "born". Alvin is unique, he has no previous lives, and no fear of the outside. His curiosity and refusal to accept things as they are mean big changes for the future of Diaspar.
Because Alvin is unique, we discover the city and the world along with him. He is close to us in his manners and way of thinking, which makes the story very accessible. Slowly we discover Earth, and the history of Earth, and the way forward for humankind. I loved the sense of mystery and discovery in this book, and the pace which is fast, even though there is not much action going on. A great what-if science fiction book, five out of five stars.

Book #12: Studio Ghibli by Colin Odell (23-01-2012 / 25-01-2012)
Ever since watching the great movie My Neighbor Totoro I am in love with the movies from Studio Ghibli. They have a great quality to them, very different from western cartoons. I have seen most of them, and now that we will be visiting the Studio Ghibli museum in a few months, I felt I had to read this book to learn more about Ghibli and it’s creators Hayao Miyazaki and Isao Takahata.
The book covers the careers of Miyazaki and Takahata, with a short piece about their work before Ghibli and how they came to found Studio Ghibli. It tells a bit about their lives, and where they take their inspiration from. Most of the book covers the Studio Ghibli movies, starting with Laputa; Castle in the Sky, and ending with Ponyo. It gives a short summary of each movie, with more details on how the movie was received both in Japan and the rest of the world, and what makes the movie special. In the last few pages shorts and other Ghibli projects are also mentioned.
As much as I love Studio Ghibli, this book was a disappointment. There was no consistency in the book. The parts of each movie had no general direction, jumping from one thought to another in every sentence. Some movies were linked to others, but not to the rest, without explanations. Some movies feature many Japanese traditions, and this was mentioned, but just when you think more explanation is coming, another subject is taken up. Most of this information I could have gotten from websites. Also, I would love to have know more about Hayao Miyazaki and Isao Takahata, and the other people who made Studio Ghibli great, and Studio Ghibli itself, more of a history book of the Studio than this list of movies. Oh, and Tanuki aren’t raccoons, they are raccoon dogs… Three out of five stars, but that’s mostly because I like Ghibli.

Lots of good classic sf you've been reading. Clarke was one of the first science fiction authors I ever read. My high school library had his The Deep Range and I fell in love.

Love Studio Ghibli's work (though I still havent seen Ponyo). Its a pity the book wasn't as well written as it could have been.

On another note Clarke was one of the first science fiction writers I read as well (A Fall of Moondust comes to mind for making a big impression on me when I was a young 'un), along with Bradbury and Asimov. With you reading The City and the Stars and cliff.hiker reading the Space odyssey books, I'm developing a strong urge to go and revisit some of his works.

I uhm... We went shopping again this weekend, visiting some of our favorite thrift stores.... Officially I was only looking for Children of Dune, knowing that Dune books show up at those stores all the time... Well, I found that book, and uhm... 31 others :D Some were only 17 cents ;)

Is that Artemis Fowl I see, there?

I recently finished Death of a Salesman, but something about it didn't seem right. I almost want to blame it on the setting. Hope you'll enjoy it more than I did, though!

Wow, what a haul!

#70, Yeah, for €1,00 I couldn't resist. :D. I read Death of a Salesman for school, I think, and I loved this 1950 copy (only €0,50!).
#71, Yeah, looks like someone dumped their 60s/70s/80s sci fi, and most of it was 3 for €0,50. I'll find room for it all later, I couldn't resist. And those Stephen Donaldson books, such a coincidence that I found them. I bought the first book, in this exact same edition from 1979/1980 in England in September. When I saw these I couldn't resist, even though I haven't even read the first one yet. But they match!

Nice haul!

Nice load of books :) Be interested what you think of Feed

Book #13: Crusader Gold by David Gibbins (25-01-2012 / 30-01-2012)
When The Da Vinci Code came out I loved it, the combination of history and adventure, and the major "what-if" at the heart of the story. Ever since them it seems to be a genre on its own, all following a similar formula. Most of them aren't brilliant in their writing and storyline, and the history is sketchy at best. But most of them are good fun to read, so I always have some in my to-be-read pile to enjoy. One of these books is this one.
I don't want to give away too much of the story, so I'll try to give some key players and subjects that are part of this story. The historical figure at the centre of it all is Harald Hardrada and his Vikings. Locations are Istanbul, Hereford, Iona, Greenland and more. As with the first book featuring Jack Howard, diving and underwater archeology are major in this story.
The story itself is a strange balance between action and explanation. Even though I liked the theory, I would have liked more adventure. I have the feeling I can describe the adventure in less than a page, while the theory could be an essay of its own. But, I can't complain too much, I enjoyed this book and the theory was pretty original to me. Four out of five stars.

Hi there, I've been absent but can always count on you for great reviews. Congrats on the upcoming wedding and your plans for Japan sounds fantastic. Pity about the Studio Ghibli book, my whole family adores these movies and we must own about 10 of them now. I found the books of My Neighbour Totoro recently (manga style) and bought these for my 13 yr old for christmas which she loves.

Thanks KiwiNyx! There is bound to be a better Ghibli book. I read a couple of days ago on a Ghibli blog a book from the nineties about the first ten years of the studio. I haven't looked into it, mainly because I assumed it is in Japanese. But now that Ghibli is also popular in the western world, maybe someday somebody will write or translate a good book about the studio.

Book #14: Partials by Dan Wells (30-01-2012 / 31-01-2012)
Note: I received an Advance Reading Copy of this book through the You Review program of The American Book Centre.

'Partials' is the new book by Dan Wells, the writer of horror and thriller novels for young adults. His last series was 'I Am Not a Serial Killer', about a boy who seems fated to become a serial killer. This book is a very different start to a new series.

'Partials' starts out quite harsh, right on the first page. Immediately we, and Kira, a fifteen year old medic, have to deal with a new-born baby dying. This is something that happens so often, the baby isn't even given a name and the mother isn't even give a chance to hold her. Welcome to the world of the future, Long Island in the 2080s. To fight our wars, we have created Partials, enhanced human battle machines. When they had outlived their usefulness as soldiers, we used them as cheap labor in mines and factories. This led to an uprising and The Break, a period where the Partials attacked the humans, and where they, along with a killer virus called RM exterminated all but about 40.000 humans who are immune. The last settlements are on Long Island, and are divided by near civil war.
The reason for this unrest is the fact that no babies born after The Break survive longer than three days. They are all killed by RM. The Senate, the ruling group on Long Island, has used the Hope Act to try to find a solution. The Hope Act says that any woman eighteen or older should get or be pregnant all the time. However, all the babies, and all the research haven't led to a cure so far, and the youngest child is already 14-year-old. If this keeps going, humans will go extinct. But Kira thinks she knows the way to a cure, and despite the risk and the unpopularity of the solution, she will seek help from the one place no one wants to find it; the Partials themselves.

I liked the book. Because Kira is a plague-baby (someone who was just a young child during The Break) she knows about as much about The Break and the Partials as we do. This makes sure that the explanations of the world and times in the story don't feel forced. The book has action from start to finish, with daring mission, chases, and attacks. Sometimes the action was a bit too much, there are so many missions it is hard to feel excited about them all, and as we go along some of the things that happen get more unrealistic. For one, a lot of people seem to get hit, and die on the spot. It is annoying that Kira refuses to accept this and put the whole party in danger because as a medic she wants to do something for them. The reason why people follow Kira is unclear to me. In at least two of the missions there was an active discussion between two of the guys on who was the leader of the mission, but as soon as Kira said something, everybody followed her nearly without question, even though her suggestions are nearly always suicidal.

But all of this doesn't take away the fact that it is an enjoyable book, that the world that Dan Wells has created is very interesting, and that despite the ongoing mystery of the virus and the Partials, this is a very nice stand-alone story. For those that enjoy young adult dystopian stories and some action, this is a recommended read. I give it four out of five stars.

January stats:

Read: 14

Fiction: 13
Non-Fiction: 1

English: 10
Dutch: 4

Ratings:
1 star: 0
2 stars: 0
3 stars: 2
4 stars: 9
5 stars: 3

Books bought: 57
From bookshop: 9
From outlet: 4
Second-hand: 34
Free: 9
ARC: 1

TBR at the start of the year: 363
TBR at the start of the month: 363
TBR at the end of the month: 394

The reading was off to a great start. A lot of science fiction, so much that sometimes I just have to read something else because all the theories start flowing together in my mind. Last year in January I read 15 books, but that was including some manga's, so I did good this month.
I bought a great many books, most of them in the haul from last weekend, when I found so much so cheap. I also paid three visits to my favorite bookshop, the American Book Centre here in The Hague. They have a great program where they pay you for content (reviews, booklists) in € 7,50 vouchers, which I used to buy two relatively expensive craft books I wanted. The free books I got from the White Bookcase here at work.

Plans for the coming month:
I have several big reads still waiting for me. A retry of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, part two of the baroque cycle The Confusion... I need to read at least one big book.

Book #15: The Kraken Wakes by John Wyndham (31-01-2012 / 01-02-2012)
At the end of last year I read John Wyndham's famous book, The Day of the Triffids. When I saw this book by him I was initially attracted to it because he wrote it. When I saw the title, and the picture of the Kraken on it, I couldn't resist. I am a sucker for books about the Kraken.
Phyllis and Mike Watson are a young couple working for the broadcasting company EBC (not BBC), writing radio scripts. The book is Mike's account of what has happened the last few years and how the world has changed. It all started on their honeymoon, when they were cruising and one night saw fast flying red orbs descent into the ocean. They made a report, but not much was made of it. Mike and Phyllis keep track of news of the red orbs, and anything else that might be connected. Soon ships start disappearing over deep stretches of ocean, and research into what is happening is violently stopped. Something is living in the Deep. Something smart, something that is attacking humankind. Slowly but surely, the threat grows, and humanity is at a loss what to do.
This book was published in 1953 and takes place in those years. The Cold War was on, so the paranoia and propaganda both from and against the Russians is a part of this story. Other than that it is a chronological account of the slow realization of humanity that they might not be the smartest species on the planet anymore. I really liked this book, I couldn't put it down. I loved the story, the slow discovery of Mike and Phyllis of what is happening, and Mike taking me as the reader along on the discovery. I loved the bantering between Mike and Phyllis, the dry humor, but also how real they were, how they sometimes get so desperate they can't do it anymore. The book reminded me a lot of The Swarm by Frank Schätzing, also a book about strange creatures in the deep keeping humanity out of the ocean. I enjoyed both books, and I give this one a five out of five stars.

Great reviews divinenanny, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell is one of my favourite fantasies so I hope you will enjoy it. A bit ponderous to begin with but if you persist the story develops into a real treasure !

I agree about Johnathan Strange et al being a great read. Funny, I wouldn't have classed it as fantasy but I guess it is. It is so steeped in british history and politics that I guess I overlooked the magical bits.. is there a genre for magical historical fiction? Will be very interested to hear your thoughts as I keep seeing many conflicting reviews on this one.

Book #16: Het einde van eeuwigheid/The end of eternity by Isaac Asimov (06-02-2012)
For the Worlds Without End Grand Master Reading Challenge (read 1 book each of 12 Grand Master authors in 2012) I really enjoyed reading "Het einde van eeuwigheid" ("The end of eternity") by Isaac Asimov. The book is originally from 1955, the version I read is the 1983 Dutch translation.
The main character is Andrew Harlan, an Eternal Technician living in Eternity. Through Eternity time travel is possible, from the 27th century upward. However, after a certain point there are the Hidden Centuries, centuries they can travel to but not enter. Together with the Computers, the Technicians make small changes in the history of mankind to prevent catastrophe and disaster in the future. The Computers calculate which changes are necessary, and the Technicians are the ones who execute the change, despite the consequences for millions of humans who will have their lives changed without even knowing about it.
Harlan is a natural talent, a famous Technician working with Senior Computer Twissell. Harlan falls in love with a non-Eternal girl Noÿs in the 482nd century, while he is also given the assignment to teach a young Eternal Cooper primitive history (ie, the history of the humanity before the twenty-fourth century). Slowly Harlan figures out why this is all happening to him, and what this all has to do with Eternity.
The book explores the paradoxes of time travel (what happens if you kill your own grand father), and the question of how far you will go for love. Because of the inclusion of characters that aren't Eternals or are still learning, everything is explained to us readers in a natural manner. And together with Harlan we learn about the more complex issues of time travel and changing history/futures. I loved the changes in the story. As soon as you think it is going one way, you think you know what the characters are about, it turns out to be something slightly different. Harlan, while not entirely likable, is a very good main character, which completes the story with the time travel theories on one side, and Harlan's personal problems on the other. The novel shows it age slightly (the use of punch cards for one thing), but overall it holds up well, even over fifty years later. Another great Asimov novel, five out of five stars.



Book #17: Netherland by Joseph O'Neill (02-02-2012 / 07-02-2012)
I have to admit, I was attracted to this book by the title, Netherland, making me wonder what the connection would be with my country, The Netherlands. It was obvious from the get go, being that the main character is Hans van den Broek, a Dutch man from The Hague, married to a British woman and living in New York. This novel is about the time Hans and his wife are separated, Hans in New York and Rachel with their son Jake in London. Hans tells the story of the time he spent alone in New York, flying back and forth to London every other weekend to see Rachel and Jake. In New York he gets involved with the cricket club, and meets Chuck Ramisoon, a hustler from Brooklyn who is trying to set up the New York Cricket Club, making cricket a big sport in America.
During the ramblings of Hans we learn about the impact 9/11 had on his wife, him and the city, his youth in The Hague, playing cricket, Hans and Rachels wedding falling apart, and his curious friendship with Chuck. He learns more about himself and the world around him, all the while growing and changing himself into someone new.
While I can't name one thing about the story I loved, I kept being drawn to it and I couldn't put the book down. Even though I don't understand the slightest thing about cricket, that didn't keep me that much from enjoying the book (even though I know someone who understands it will love it more). A very nice book, a good read. Four out of five stars.

Book #18: De gekrompene/The Shrinking Man by Richard Matheson (07-02-2012)
A classic science fiction/horror story about a man who shrinks one seventh of an inch a day, an inch a week.
Scott is out on a boat with his brother, when a strange mist passes over him (his brother is below deck). From that moment he notices that he is becoming smaller every day, shrinking. The book is a description both of the last week of shrinking, the final inch, while Scott is trapped in the basement and trying to survive in an ever growing world, and flashbacks about the last year and a half. He was happily married to Louise with a daughter, Beth. They had just moved so Scott could get a better job, money was and is tight. And then this happened.
Scott is the focus of the story, it is about how he deals with what is happening to him, and what it does to the relationships he has with those around him. I thought this was a very good book, very 'realistic' in the emotions Scott experienced. I liked how the 'why' of the shrinking wasn't as important as the 'what now'. And the ending was nice, even if it was a tat unrealistic (yeah, even after 200+ pages of a man slowly shrinking). Four out of five stars.

Book #19: The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi (08-02-2012 / 10-02-2012)
In my quest to read all Hugo winners, I am also picking up the newest winners as soon as I can. Sometimes this leads to me buying books I am almost certain I won't like, based on the summary on the back. I buy them anyway because so many reader can't be wrong. Luckily, with The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi, all the other reviewers and Hugo jury was write, and my first reaction was wrong.
It is the future, and genetic manipulation by corporations has led to wide-spread extinction of normal food and animals. Corporations offer crops that are resistant to diseases developed and spread by them for only a few generations. This has led to war, starvation, and a fight for genetic material. The story takes place in Bangkok. Thailand is one of the few countries resisting the corporations, with a ministry of Environment and one of Trade keeping an eye, a strict eye, on things. In this city we follow several characters: a man from one of the corporations, a general from the ministry of Environment, a Chinese refugee from Malaysia, and a Windup girl. The last is a genetically modified human, built by the Japanese to serve, but reviled by the Thai and recognizable by her choppy movements. All characters come together in the fight the Thai fight to survive, with the Windup girl being a center of it all.
Industrial, dirty cities aren't for me, and a book taking place in one didn't seem attractive to me at all for that reason. But I am glad I read this book anyway, because I couldn't put it down. The story takes a bit to get going, but in the meantime Bacigalupi builds a great world. Not to live in, but well thought out, and very realistic. This could happen in our future, some of the things that have led to the world of The Windup Girl are happening here and now. That makes the book scary but also very good. In the end it is all about the fight for survival, as a person, a group, a country. A great read and highly recommended, five out of five stars.

Book #20: De Vredesoorlog/The Peace War by Vernor Vinge (10-02-2012 / 13-02-2012)
Just the title of this book is contradictory, and therefore pretty intriguing. A peace war? Yes, a peace war.
It is 'the future' (1997 and 2047, the book was first published in 1984), and the 'bobble' is invented. It is a forcefield that can encapsule something, killing it in the moment. The Peace, started by the scientists who invented the bobble, has used the bobbles to put an end to war by encapsulating all hostile, explosive elements. The population of the world is greatly diminished by biologically engineered plagues. Because of this, and their quest against war, the Peace has forbidden all biological and electronic development to prevent the rest of the world inventing a solution to the bobbles or different weapons to rekindle war. All this leads to a pretty bleak life for most humans, as the Peace is effectively a dictatorship ruling most of the world. The story starts fifty years after the first bobble appeared, with Wili, a math wiz-kid, Paul, an old inventor, and weird things happening to the bobbles. For the people living in hiding of the Peace, this might be their chance to finally offer a real fight.
This book was a Hugo nominee, and based on that I expected a pretty good story, well written with good characters. Instead I felt more like I was reading a young adult novel. There was something like romance (also promised to me by the cover of the book), which wasn't really explored. There was adventure, a trip through the land under the threat of the Peace, but I never really believed the threat. Anytime something difficult came up, anytime the main characters were really under threat, somebody magically had the solution. Something maybe never seen in the past fifty years, and all of a sudden it is there, within less time than anybody ever needed. On top of all that, the ending was pretty confusing, and felt like a set-up for a second book. All in all, pretty disappointing, three out of five stars.

Oh, I'm glad you liked The Wind-up Girl! It's on my shorter wishlist. :)

Haha, I love how you also have a shorter wishlist, I keep two myself. Books I really want, and books I want if they are on sale or second-hand.

Book #21: De hagenridder/The Hedge Knight by George R. R. Martin (13-02-2012)
Last year I read all of George R. R. Martin's 'A Song of Ice and Fire' series with great pleasure. I loved the writing, the unpredictability, the intrigue, the politics. And as a bonus there was the HBO TV show to enjoy. So, when I saw this novella, taking place in the same world but about a century before the main books, I couldn't help myself, I had to have it and immediately read it. And in comparison to the main books, it is pretty short with its 143 pages (2006 Dutch edition).
It is the story of Dunk, squire to a hedge knight (a hedge knight offers his sword to any master he pleases, and travels around looking for employment). His knight dies, and Dunk decides to take his equipment and enter a tournament himself, as a knight. On his way there he meets Egg, a stable boy with an attitude who wants to be a squire. The book covers their adventures at the tournament of Ashford. There they meet the ancestors of the characters we know and love (or love to hate) from the main books, such as Lannisters, Baratheons and of course the Targaryens, who are still ruling the kingdoms.
Even though this was a short story, it is a true George R. R. Martin story. Unexpected happenings (I loved the twists), nasty characters, politics, goodness, chivalry. I was glad to be back in Martin's world, and wished the story was much (much, much) longer. Four out of five stars.

Book #22: Gods smidse/The Forge of God by Greg Bear (14-02-2012 / 15-02-2012)
When I was pretty young (11 or 12), I already loved reading. I asked my dad if I could read one of his books (my friend and me were kicked out of the adult section of the library, even though we had already read all the good stuff at the kids section). He gave me Songs of Earth and Power by Greg Bear, and to this day, it is still one of my favorite books. So, anytime I can get me hands on some Greg Bear, I don't hesitate, even though most of his other stuff is more science fiction than the fantasy world of Songs. I bought Anvil of Stars a while back, so when I found the book that comes before that one, The Forge of God (Gods Smidse in Dutch) I couldn't help myself. I bought it and immediately started it.
It is the 1990s. Aliens have come to earth, evident from the mountains that have appeared were none were before. Something has landed in Death Valley and something else in Australia. Humankind communicates with the aliens in the US, but what they tell us, actually warn us about, is pretty horrible. But the aliens in Australia tell a completely different story. Who is right? And what can we do?
The first part of the book is mostly about the discovery of the aliens in the US, and the research into them and into the story they tell. Halfway through the book humans have to start reacting to the news, and do this in various way, trying to deal with something so huge through religion or with force. But a solution is offered to some, and the rest of the book is the conclusion of the arrival.
The start of the story was pretty slow, although it was a nice pace of discovery, and doubt about what to do. The rest of the book moved pretty fast, and I couldn't put it down. I loved how the ending is something I have not often seen in science fiction. For me this book was pretty original, and I really liked the story, so four out five stars.

Book #23: SF Omnibus by Max Ehrlich, Robert Heinlein and Isaac Asimov (16-02-2012 / 20-02-2012)
This book contains three science fiction novella's/books: The Big Eye by Max Ehrlich, The Man Who Sold the Moon by Robert Heinlein and Pebble in the Sky by Isaac Asimov. Like all collections, this was a mixed bag.
The first and longest story was The Big Eye. The story started out with many, many pages detailing the Cold War that has nearly become a real war. The threats are great, and many big cities like New York and Washington are nearly empty, everybody having fled in-land. There is a suspicion that the Russians have a secret weapon, because the US is plagued by earthquakes and other strange event in nature in places where they should not occur. The president is almost ready to press the red button when he is stopped by a phone call from somewhere you least expect it, an astronomical observatory. They reveal that a planet is rapidly approaching earth, and a collision is unavoidable. The rest of the story details how humankind deals with the knowledge of the time and day of its destruction.
The story was alright. There was too much emphasis on the Cold War, but I understand this, given the date the story was written. After that has passed the story is actually pretty interesting, picturing the reaction of humankind to extinction and total destruction.
The second story was The Man Who Sold the Moon, about a shrewd businessman living in a future version of earth, a time when cars fly and rockets are used for long distance rapid flights across the earth. The businessman wants to go to the moon, and devises a business-plan to invent the spacecraft needed and to exploit this to its full potential.
It is interesting to read how the race to the moon could have gone, if it had been in the hands of private investors instead of government agencies. The story turns tragic in the end, but for me, this was the perfect completion of a well thought out version of events.
The last story was the best, Pebble in the Sky. The story takes place on earth in the Foundation universe. A man is walking along a street in Chicago in the now, and due to a freak radioactive accident, is thrown far into the future. Earth is now a backwater planet, hated and hating all other planets where humankind has spread and started the Empire. The man gets caught up in a plot by Earthmen and he has to choose who he belongs to, the Earthmen or the humans in space.
This was a classic Asimov for me. I loved being back in the Foundation universe, and seeing references to things I know from the other books. There was a bit too much of a coincidence in this story of people meeting at just the right time, but Asimov does a nice job of putting these coincidences to good use.
All in all I give the collection four out of five stars.

Wow, some excellent books there. I was happy to read your George RR Martin review. I was looking at some of his other books only recently and wondered if they were as good as GoT. Sounds like they are - thanks!

Thanks! This was a Song of Ice and Fire book by Martin, I don't know if any of his other stuff is as good as this one. Twice last week I had Dying of the Light by him in my hands in the bookstore, which isn't ASOIAF, but it was a bit too expensive for me.

Book #24: Jamrach's Menagerie by Carol Birch (20-02-2012 / 21-02-2012)
Every year I wait very impatiently for the Man Booker Prize short list. I use this list as a guideline to get myself to read more ‘normal’ fiction instead of science fiction, fantasy or adventure books. I might not be attracted to all of the books on the list, and I have no need to read them all for completion, but every year I pick some. And how nice it was last year that the prize was awarded just as we were vacationing in England, so all short list books were on sale. I picked up some, including this one, Jamrach’s Menagerie by Carol Birch.
This is the story of and told by Jaff, a poor boy growing up in Victorian London. When he was eight he met a tiger in the street, and instead of being scared, he touched its nose. The tiger picked him up, and Jaff was freed by Mr. Jamrach and survived. This changed his life so much that he calls the events his second birth. Soon he starts work for Mr. Jamrach, who owns a pet store. He sells not only the usual, but any animal his clients want, he has or gets, including elephants, crocodiles and tigers. Jaff meets Tim there, a boy with whom he has a love/hate relationship, and Tim’s sister Ishbell. Years later Tim is selected to go with one of Jamrach’s collectors on a journey to find a dragon in Indonesia (a Komodo Dragon it later turns out), and Jaff finds a way to join them. Most of the book is the adventurous and tragic story of that journey.
The story itself moves pretty fast, and there is never a dull moment. The stuff that happens is sometimes pretty horrifying, but never does it feel unreal. Especially the ending makes it a book of the twenty-first century, a realistic continuation of the story in stead of a “and they live happily every after”-type ending. I really liked the writing and the story, even more now that I found out that Mr. Jamrach was real and so was the incident of the boy and the tiger. Four out of five stars.

Thanks for the review of Jamrach's Menagerie divinenanny, it goes straight onto my To Read list !

I keeping picking up Jamrach's Menagerie and putting it down unsure, nice to see a good review of it.. although not great for my wallet ;)

Book #25: Slan by A. E. van Vogt (21-02-2012 /22-02-2012)
This is one of the classics of science fiction, first published in 1946 (1940 serialized), written by A.E. van Vogt. It is the story of Jommy Cros, a Slan boy of nine years old. The Slan are more than human, have two hearts, tendrils on their heads and are telepathic. They are viciously hunted down by humans, who feel threatened by the slans. They think that the Slans want to take over the world, as they have tried this in the past. The story starts when Jommy's mother is killed, and he is left to hide until he is fifteen and can carry out his secret mission, given to him by his already murdered father. Meanwhile we also follow Kathleen, another young slan kept prisoner by a human dictator.
During his long mission, which stretches out nearly ten years, Jommy learns a lot about the history of humans and slans and tries to bring the two closer together.
Even though the book is pretty short, it packs in a lot of adventure and ideas. The ending was pretty unexpected and ties everything wonderfully together. A classic that holds up pretty well even nearly 70 years after first being written. Four out five stars.

Book #26: One Day by David Nicholls (22-02-2012 / 24-02-2012)
After a pretty stressful week both at work and at home I needed something to read that didn't require too much thinking on my part. I chose One Day by David Nicholls for this reason.
It is the story of Emma and Dexter, told by showing us readers their lives on one day, July 15th each year, for twenty years. The book starts in 1988, with their graduation. They are close to starting a romantic relationship but instead become good friends. In the twenty years their lives are vastly different. They are sometimes great, sometimes tragic, and sometimes they are not on speaking terms.
I know the book has been hyped a lot, but I enjoyed it a lot. It was by no means a light read, but it was good. Four out of five stars.

Book #27: When God Was a Rabbit by Sarah Winman (24-02-2012 / 26-02-2012)
I bought this book purely because of the title, and the pretty cover. All it said on the back was that this was a story about a brother and a sister, and about growing up. Not much to go on, but I am glad I did.
The story is told by Elly, a girl growing up in England. She is very attached to her brother Joe, who is five years older than her, and took care of her when their mother was depressed because of the death of her parents. This makes the two of them very close. She has a friend, Jenny Penny, who is growing up with a young single mother, who has many boyfriends, and you just know that a lot is wrong in Jenny Penny's life. When Elly is 9 the family moves, making Elly slowly lose touch with Jenny Penny. The book has a pause, picking up again when Elly and Jenny Penny get re-acquainted. It is the end of the nineties, and Elly and Joe have grown up, but they don't know everything yet.
This is indeed a book about a brother and a sister, and their relationship. But also about how they grow up, and the influence they have on their friends and their friends have on them. It is also about their extended family, about growing older, about accepting death, about being content in your life. It is about finding love, and accepting who you are, and who others are. Quite a lot for a little over 300 pages, but it all fits. I really enjoyed the emotional rollercoaster of this book, to me, it is complete. I loved all the characters, and they seemed real to me, with good and bad sides. Four out of five stars.

Book #28: Feed by Mira Grant (27-02-2012 / 28-02-2012)
The title of this book is pretty smart, taking advantage of the modern double meaning of the word “Feed”. In this book it both refers to an RSS feed from a blog, as well as eating, because the book is about a world where being eaten by zombies is a real threat and news published by blogs is very important.
It is 2040, and the world is overrun by zombies, reanimated dead people who want nothing more than to eat flesh and infect living humans. The zombies arrived when two viruses, Kellis (to heal the common cold) and Amberlee (to heal cancer) joined to create this monstrosity. Every human is infected, and as soon as they die, they come back as zombies. All other mammals over 40 pounds suffer the same fate, and are therefore dangerous for humans. Humanity has learned to live with this, using security measures as frequent blood testing, no gathering in big crowds, armament, and different building styles. When the deadly effects of the combination of the two viruses became clear, it were the bloggers who reported on it first, when the print media were still downplaying the issue as rumors or hoaxes. This has heightened the respect for news bloggers in this dystopian future.
Georgia and Shaun Mason, together with Buffy are a team of reporters for one of those blogs. Georgia is a newsie, who reports facts, Shaun is an Irwin who reports on adventures he has when he goes into zombie-territories, and Buffy is a fictional, who writes stories and poems about life. Together they are picked as the first blog team to follow a presidential candidate, Senator Ryman, who is in the race to become the Republican nominee. Usually the candidates only have traditional press in their press team, but Ryman is one of the younger politicians and gives the three bloggers full access. While following the senator around they uncover a secret plot and live through heartbreaking adventures while they learn more about zombies and politics.
I don’t know why, but I love (reading about) zombies. There is just something about the threat of mindless killers who are slow, but persistent, hard to kill, and great in numbers. This book follows the zombie-lore pretty closely, while adding a pretty realistic explanation of how they came to be. The world described in ‘Feed’ is a world that has recovered from the shock and is now moving on, trying to live life as usual, including politics and religion. It is the politics I wasn’t to keen on in this book. It is probably the frame of mind I have now, but I am pretty annoyed with politics in real life, so that feeling carried over when I was reading the book. But then again, it did offer intrigue and adventure, and it did fit the story. I felt sad reading the book, knowing what was coming (it was pretty clear from about half way through the book), but it was good. I really liked this take on the zombie-dystopian future of our world. Four out of five stars.

Februari stats:

Read: 14

Fiction: 14

English: 8
Dutch: 6

Ratings:
1 star: 0
2 stars: 0
3 stars: 1
4 stars: 9
5 stars: 4

Books bought: 20
From bookshop: 1
Second-hand: 10
Free: 9

TBR at the start of the year: 363
TBR at the start of the month: 394
TBR at the end of the month: 391

Another good month for reading, I read more than ever in a February (and I went to sleep early yesterday, so the bonus of 29-2 didn't give me much more time). I didn't read a big book like I planned, mostly due to stress at home and at work. I didn't need the added pressure of having a big book that just won't end. I read mostly easy quick reads. A lot of science fiction still, but also some regular fiction as a distraction from the stress. I didn't buy as many books as before, mostly some second hand I happened to run into, and nine free books from work.

Plans for the coming month:
I doubt I'll get to read much this coming month, as this is the month of my wedding and honeymoon. So no plans, we'll see.

Book #29: De ontheemde/The Dispossessed by Ursula le Guin (28-02-2012 / 05-03-2012)
This is one of the absolute must-reads of Science Fiction, a book that has won many awards (Hugo, Locus, Nebula) and is on many lists (one of which is the 1001 list). So, when I found it in a second-hand bookshop, I had to have it, and when I was looking for a good book to read which wouldn’t be too much of a gamble, this is the book I picked to read. I can’t say I don’t regret it…
One thing the reader must know is that while this is science fiction in the sense that it takes place on a different planet in a different galaxy, where there are spaceships and the Hain and Terra’s, it isn’t really that science-fictiony. It is more of an anthropological book, about social interaction, politics, freedom and others (other people, ‘them’). There are two planets, Anarres and Urras, Anarres being the moon of Urras. Urras is a planet divided into nations, all with their own political systems and strife between them. Anarres was settled 150 years ago by anarchists, who wanted to unleash a revolution on Urras and were given the moon to settle down on with their own political system. The people on Anarres have no government, no property and total freedom. Everybody works for everybody, and everybody shares everything. Even love is free, marriage doesn’t exist and partnerships are rare.
On this world Shevek lives, a physicist who is discovering theories about linear and circular time. Slowly he discovers how free he really is in the anarchistic culture of Anarres and he sets out to do something about it, landing himself on Urras. Urras is very different from where he grew up, and slowly he discovers what that means to him and to what he has set out to do.
I really struggled with this book, taking longer to read through it than I normally would. Part of this may have been my frame of mind at the moment, where I was really craving a simple book I could just enjoy without too much though. The Dispossessed didn’t really offer me that. Long passages are filled with elaborations on the political (or non-political) structure on Anarres and what that means for the humans living there, both practically and emotionally. Other passages where about the scientific discovery Shevek was about to make. For me this was all a bit too much. I get what Le Guin tried to do (and from reading other reviews, succeeded to do), but I guess I was not ready for it, or are a bit too cynical for it now. I give this book three out of five stars, it not being the best Le Guin I have read.

divinenanny, I have spent too much time away from your thread! So many books here to add to the wishlist.

Thanks!

Book #30: The Midwich Cuckoos by John Wyndham (05-03-2012)
Another John Wyndham book, one I had never heard of before. But it is considered something of a classic, as is clear by its inclusion in the 1001-books-you-must-read-before-you-die list. It has been filmed as the Village of the Damned, of which I recognize the screens, but have never seen.
The book is about the English village of Midwich, which, on a September evening, is enclosed by a dome. Everybody in the dome, or who enters the dome, falls asleep, and nobody wakes before the dome is lifted. Soon after the dome is lifted, all women who were under the dome find out that they are pregnant. Nine months later, the babies are born.
Like the previous Wyndham book I read (The Kraken Wakes) the story is told by an outside observer, not a scientist and not somebody who is going through it himself. In this case it is Richard, a man who has lived in Midwich with his wife for only a year, and who was in London when the event happened. Because of that his wife is not affected, and he is just telling us what he sees and hears. Other characters are Gordon Zellaby, a well-to-do (aristocratic?) writer who lives in the town mansion, and the rest of the villagers. The book covers the event, the birth of the children, and nine years later, when the children are grown and exhibiting more and more of their strange abilities.
I really liked this book. I liked the story, reminding me of modern stories (most notably Under the Dome), and the dilemma the children ultimately pose to the villagers. I like the humor of the narrator and Wyndham. I like the calm and reasonable observations of Richard. And I like the ending, inevitable and clean. Four out of five stars.

some great classic science fiction! I'm pretty sure I've read Slan, The Dispossessed and The Midwich Cuckoos ... but I should go back and reread just to make sure. Thanks for your great reviews!

I thought I had read The Dispossessed, but it doesn't seem at all familiar from your comments... Sorry you didn't like that one more, but, yeah, I wouldn't be picking up le Guin for a fluffy read. :) (Except The Wizard of Earthsea, which is an old favourite of mine.)

Some good reading going on here, sorry it's been so long between visits! Trying to catch up today...

Thanks, I missed you on the thread :D I have learned now to save my le Guin TBR's for a... calmer time ;). Thanks for the compliments :D

Book #31: De gouden appels van de zon/The Golden Apples of the Sun by Ray Bradbury (06-03-2012)
I read Fahrenheit 451 a while ago and loved it, and with my new obsession with collecting old science fiction, I couldn’t resist this book by him, especially not with the wonderful title of ‘The Golden Apples of the Sun’.
This is a short story collection, not containing any novellas or stories over 15 pages long. I always find it difficult to review such a collection as some stories are better than others. Overall I really liked the book and read it all in almost one sitting. There are some science fiction stories (about time and space travel), some about the future, and some that are just about the here and now, and that seem to have a different message. To me it stood out that some stories that weren’t fantasy/science fiction were about racism, both against African-Americans (The Big Black and White Game) and Latino’s (Sun and Shadow). Some other stories seemed almost like fairy tales (The Flying Machine, The Golden Kite, The Silver Wind). All in all this was a very good collection, and I am happy that I have more by Bradbury in my to-be-read pile. Four out of five stars.

Book #32: Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer (06-03-2012 / 07-03-2012)
Besides Harry Potter and Perry Jackson, one of the other supernatural adventures written for kids/young adults that gained fame these past few years is Artemis Fowl. But in this story, the title character is not the hero, but the villain.
Artemis is a twelve-year-old boy, heir to a long, long line of bad guys. Now that his father is disappeared, he has taken over, and he needs a lot of cash to pay for the upkeep of his ancestral home in Ireland. And he has figured out a way to this is to steal the Book from an elf and use it to think of a master plan. Indeed, an elf. This is a world where elves were here long before we were, and are now underground, hiding from us and daylight. Together with goblins, trolls, and other mythical creatures. And Artemis kidnaps an elf, Holly, an agent for the elfBI. The rest of the book covers the plight of the elves to keep themselves hidden from humanity and to free Holly from Artemis.
Like the other young adult adventures I have read this book is very fast paced and filled with action. The mythology of the elves is pretty good, even though not many details are revealed, and it is pretty nice to have an evil main character. I am looking forward to the other parts of this series. Four out of five stars.

Book #33: Een reis naar Arcturus/A Voyage to Arcturus by David Lindsay (07-03-2012 / 11-03-2012)
This is one of the early classics of science fiction, loved by C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien and many more. This book came from my dads collection, and I was curious what it was about.
This the story of Maskull, who, at a séance, meets his friend Nightspore and a friend of Nightspore, Krag. Pretty soon in the story things turn weird. At the séance a dead man shows up with a weird grin on his face, and he is destroyed by Krag. Krag offers to take Maskull and Nightspore on a voyage to Arcturus, to the planet Tormance. When Maskull wakes up at Tormance, in a desert, Nightspore and Krag are nowhere to be found, and Maskull has a third limb growing from his chest. This starts the weirdest journey, where Maskull meets many characters, with different bodies, different philosophies and different landscapes.
If I had to describe this book in one word, it would be weird. It flows everywhere, reading like someone is either high or dreaming. I understand that the different transformations, lands and characters represent different philosophies and/or religions, but I have a feeling a lot of that went over my head. Maybe this is a book you have to study more, and have some background information on to truly appreciate. It is fantastical, and I get how for some writers this is inspirational, but to me it was too much and too weird. I don't think I got the story, nor the ending, and thereby missed much that there was there to enjoy. However, I kept picking the book up, intrigued by all the adventures, and keen to know what Lindsay would think up next. Three out of four stars.

ooh The Midwich Cuckoos, what a great story that is. I read it so long ago. I really must read it again.

I think I will have to pass on a A Voyage to Arcturus, although I am tempted. Not up to speed on philosophical and religious theories!

Playing catch up here, forgetting for a minute about exact dates.

Book #34: Verdwaald tussen sterren/Orphans of the Sky - Robert A. Heinlein
I was looking for some science fiction to read that I could be reasonably certain of I would like, so I picked up this book, by Heinlein. And I got what I expected and wanted so I am glad I did.
This is the story of the Ship. Sent out into space to travel generations to another star system it is still in space. But mutiny early on led to the ship’s purpose being forgotten, Earth being forgotten, even the outside being forgotten. Until the humans and the muties, mutants descendant from the mutineers, start combining what they know and some of them figure out what they are meant to do.
This was a very short and quick story. There isn’t much philosophizing or elaboration about why things are as they are, or how they should or would be. The story is filled with action and discovery, and I liked it. Four out of five stars.

Book #35: In de greep van generzijds/A Stir of Echoes - Richard Matheson
While I bought this book because of Matheson’s science fiction writings, it’s actually a work of horror or fantastical fiction.
Tom is a normal guy, living with his young son and pregnant wife in fifties California. At a dinner party his brother-in-law hypnotized him, just for fun. Famous last words, as this apparently activates a latent ability in Tom. He can empathize, he feels what others feel, and he gets visions that appear to predict horrible things in the future or happening miles away. The weirdest thing is the appearance of a woman in their house, a woman that he doesn’t know.
While this wasn’t quite what I expected, I did enjoy this book, especially the struggles of Tom and his wife and Anne to understand what is happening to Tom. The only thing I didn’t like about the book was the ending, which came about two pages too soon. Still, four out of five stars.

Book #36: Fallen - Lauren Kate
In search of an easy read I picked up Fallen, which I had bought with its sequel on sale a couple of weeks ago. Fallen is a Young Adult novel in the supernatural genre that is so popular these days.
Fallen is about a seventeen-year-old girl, Luce, who is sent to reform school after her would-be boyfriend spontaneously combusted. Luce has been seeing Shadows all her life, darkness that nobody else could see, and has basically been labelled mentally ill because of it. The new school she is at is very tough, both because of the kids, the continuous surveillance, the gloomy, marshy southern environment and the rundown prison-like buildings. And in the midst of all this is David, a boy who wants nothing to do with her, going so far as flipping her off and sending her away. But she is attracted to him, very much, and she can’t explain the feeling she has that they’ve met before. Besides David, there is also Cam, a nice boy who does want to date her, but Luce cannot get David out of her head. Soon she discovers there is more between Heaven and Earth, and why she and David are both doomed and meant to be together. Forever.
The book follows the YA-for-girls formula pretty well. Luce is a lonely, sad girl, and both David and Cam are perfect. Their relationships are pretty unhealthy, both boys behaving pretty badly towards Luce, and she behaves like a naive young girl.
But, if you can put that, and the not-so-perfect writing aside, it is an enjoyable story for YA fans. It does feel like a part one, not explaining too much about the supernatural, but that is the way these series work. Three out of five stars.

Book #37: Torment - Lauren Kate
After reading Fallen a couple of days ago I dove right into its sequel, Torment. And I liked it better than the first one.
Luce now knows about her and Daniel’s story and about Angels. But the story has just started and now Daniel has dropped her off at a new school and left her there. This school is different though, in California and filled with perfect kids. In the eighteen days that Luce and Daniel have to be apart she learns a great deal. About the supernatural world of Angels, Demons, Announcers and other beings. About her past. And about her relationship with Daniel, which isn’t exactly equal or healthy. In the end she has to decide what to do, by herself, for herself.
Because this book dove more into the mythology of Angels and Demons and everything around them, I liked the book a whole lot more. It is still fluff, and reads like a schoolgirl fantasy, with all the perfect kids, guys liking Luce, Luce’s natural talents and things like that, but it’s fun. I actually want to read part three to see where this is going, because the story does end in a cliffhanger. Three out of four stars.

Book #38: Ringwereld/Ringworld - Larry Niven
This is one of the classics of science fiction, a winner of both the Hugo and the Nebula awards, so a must-read for me. And again, I was not disappointed.
It is the story of the human Louis Wu, who, together with the puppeteer (an alien race with two heads and fur, an naturally pretty scared and worried) Nessus, the Kzint (another alien race, looking like a big orange cat an naturally war-like) SpeakertoAnimals, and the lucky human Teena, travels to the Ringworld. This is a strange, made place, a ring around a star to live on, a lot larger than earth or any other know planet. But the exploration goes wrong, and soon they are trying to find a way back home, while discovering Ringworld and its history.
This was a great read for me, reading like truly one of the classics of science fiction. It had some of the must have elements, the future, the future of humans, aliens, alien world, space travel and speculation. A nice, enjoyable book, which makes me want to dive into the second one right away. Four out of five stars.

Book #39: De bouwers van Ringwereld/The Ringworld Engineers - Larry Niven
This is the sequel to Ringworld, written ten years later, after Larry Niven had corresponded with many people about the physical possibilities of Ringworld. The story takes place twenty-three years after the first.
Louis Wu is addicted to the current, a pleasurable impulse he receives through an implant in his neck. And then one day he is taken by a puppeteer who appears in his apartment out of nowhere. SpeakertoAnimals has also been kidnapped (although he is now called Chmeee). Together they are stuck on a ship with the Hindmost, the partner of Nessus. He has been dethroned, and has a risky plan to regain power, by going to the Ringworld and finding valuable stuff for the puppeteers. He has kidnapped Louis and Chmeee to help him. But when they arrive at the Ringworld, twenty-three years after they have left, it is off-centre, threatening to crash into the sun and kill the whole system. Can they do something about it? Even with the Hindmost and his own goals? And can they figure out more about the history of the Ringworld? And will they see Teela Brown again?
It was nice to return to the world of Ringworld again, especially now that most parts about the physics and history seemed better thought out. I was surprised that this not only a sequel to the first Ringworld, but you also should have read Niven’s other book, ‘Protector’. I have that book but have not read it yet, and am afraid that this book spoiled it a bit for me.
The rest of this book was good, a fun read, with new species to discover, a new mystery to solve. The ending did seem a bit rushed, as if it had to fit in the final fifty pages, but it still makes me want to read more about the Ringworld and by Larry Niven. Four out of five stars.

Book #40: Beschermheer/Protector - Larry Niven
After reading about the Ringworld, I saw the Protector being referenced in the second book. I thought to myself, but I have a Niven book about a Protector, maybe I need to read that before reading more Ringworld books. So I did. This is a pretty short story, divisible into two parts.
In the first part of the book humanity lives throughout our solar system, divided in Earth and the moon, and the Belt, where people live in space all their lives. One day, while detecting monopole magnets, the first Outsider, alien, is spotted. This is a protector, who has travelled 32000 years to find the colony of Pak aliens who were stranded near Sol 2,5 million years ago. And he finds us. And Brennan, the first human he meets. The second part of the book takes place a few hundred years later when humans are kidnapped every now and again, disappear for four month and then return with amnesia. The Protector has something to do with that, and all will come to a climax to protect the human race.
Even though the book felt rushed, it was very enjoyable. I would have liked it if most parts were fleshed out a bit more, but I know that some of the philosophy behind the Pak Protectors and humankind comes back in the Ringworld books. Four out of five stars, and a must read for Ringworld fans.

Book #41: The Ringworld Throne by Larry Niven (03-04-2012 / 06-04-2012)
This is the third book in the Ringworld series, taking place in the universe that Niven has created, where humans and humanoids are descendants from the Pak protectors. This book focusses on the protectors on the Ringworld, protectors of and from several different races. It is several years after the events in the Ringworld Engineers. Louis Wu is travelling the Ringworld alone, while some of the Ringworlders that have appeared before are fighting an infestation of vampires. Louis returns to the Hindmost and his ship, is joined by Acolyte, the son of Chmeee, and is turned into a slave by a vampire-protector. In the end the main question of the book is: "Who is the best protector for the whole of the Ringworld, all the species together?".
I don't know if it was my mood while reading, or if it was the book itself. I am guessing a bit of both, but the book was pretty confusing to me. I still don't know what the main vampire infestation has to do with the story of the protectors. I couldn't follow half of the things that were happening with Louis, the protectors, the old protectors, Teela, the people from Earth, Ringworld. I felt it was all too much, all was stuffed in this book to give the reader the feeling that he/she is back in the world of Ringworld. It was all a bit disappointing, so three out of four stars from me.

Book #42: On Beauty by Zadie Smith (08-04-2012 / 12-04-2012)
After reading all kinds of fantasy and science fiction in these past weeks, I decided to pick up a 'regular' fiction book for once. I read "On Beauty" by Zadie Smith, a book on the 2006 "1001 books you must read before you die" list.
This is the story of the Belsey family, with white, English dad Howard, black, American mom Kiki, and their three children Jeremy, Zora and Levi. It is about Howard's infidelity and inability to write a book and get tenure at the university where he teaches. About Kiki's reaction to Howard's infidelity and her children growing up. About Jeremy trying to find his own place away from his family. About Zora who is trying hard to put her upbringing into practice at the university where her dad teaches. And about Levi, who is trying to live true to his black identity, trying to be more 'street' than his privileged upbringing.
The book is a view into their life for a year or two. It isn't a book with a main storyline, as all characters have their own problems and their own story. This is both the strength and the weakness of the book for me. While I was intrigued by the story, and wanted to know how the lives of the Belseys went on, I did miss the main theme that drags me along. While I enjoyed the book, I can't say exactly why, and if I had to write a recommendation, I couldn't. That is why I give this book three out of five stars.

Book #43: The Colour of Magic by Terry Pratchett (12-04-2012 / 15-04-2012)
Many years ago I tried my first Discworld novel, Monstrous Regiment. I didn't finish it, I just couldn't get into it. But so many people seem to love this series, I felt I had to give it another chance. So, I decided to leave all the flowcharts on how to get started in this series for what they were, and just start at the beginning, with the first book published in the series. This time I was not disappointed, in fact I think I am hooked!
This is the story of the wizard (of sorts) Rincewind and the tourist Twoflower who get involved in all kinds of adventures on the world of Discworld. Discworld is a disc that is perched on top of four elephants who stand on a turtle who is travelling through space. Magic is alive and well on the island, as are all kinds of strange things, such as walking travelling boxes.
It is hard to write a short summary of this book where so much happens, and the magic of the story is in the humor, both of the world building and of the events that happen to mainly Rincewind. I loved the references to our world, like the picture making box that Twoflowers has, and the dimensional crossover. I am now truly drawn into this series, and really want to pick up the second books soon, and read them all in publishing order. Four out of five stars.

I think the first two books are still my favourites (although I have a soft spot for the Guards Guards series of books, much more tongue in cheek fantasy than the later books and of course early Rincewind is a great character.

Wonderful that you have gotten into the Discworld series divinenanny, great reading times ahead !

Oh hey thanks for the link to that flowchart. I need to get my Discworld reading back on track!

Thanks for the comments. My guess is that Discworld will be one of those series where I will be happy to find second hand books every now and then :D

I want to share with you what I have been working on these past few days. Last Saturday evening my brother and mother came over, and they brought with them... a bookcase! I have been waiting for it almost a year, but it was so tall the boards never fit into any car... So, on Sunday we built our bookcases. A new one in the closetroom, and a small one in the living room. I have been arranging all my books, liberating most of them from the 8 or so boxes I have had stacked in our study. And they all fit! I even have 10 cm of space left to fill!

Fiction bookcase, sorted by author


Living room bookcase (music, craft, antiques)


Non-fiction bookcase (biographies, humor, popular science, history, mythology, anthropology, travel and museology)

Ooooohhhhh. I love them!

NOTHING is more fun than new bookcases! Nothing! Unless it's loading them.

Ooh, glad you're getting into Discworld! The only thing I've noticed with reading orders is that people tend to like the non-recurring character books (like Monstrous Regiment and Pyramids and such) better after they've read more of the Rincewind, Witches, Death, and City Watch books. Maybe because at that point they're ready to explore more of the Disc and get out of the familiar landscapes (as it were).

Also, lovely bookcases! Nothing better than getting all the books sorted and shelved!

lovely bookcases!

I love pictures of book cases, those are great :) I love the the little cupboards too. I an rather in awe of people who build bookcases I just about helped put Ikea ones up.

Thanks! I love that my books have a (accessible) home now, I like to see them and be able to get them etc.

Book #44: The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien (16-04-2012 / 17-04-2012)
Ten years ago, when Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy came out, I bought LotR and read in one go. I had tried before, but got stuck on Tom Bombadil, as many people do. But when I tried again, I loved it. So, of course I bought The Hobbit next, ready for more. But I hated it. I found it dull and put the book away, giving it two stars and making it one of the few books I abandoned halfway through. However, now that Peter Jackson is making The Hobbit into two movies, and with the pictures and videos from the set looking so great, I just had to try again. And I am so glad I did!
A summary is hardly needed, but for completeness, here it is. Bilbo Baggins is a Hobbit leading a quiet life in Bag-End. Until Gandalf shows up, and he gets taken along on a quest with thirteen dwarfs (Tolkien's spelling). He is the burglar, and also needed to make a luckier number. Together they are travelling to the Lonely Mountain to defeat the dragon Smaug and get their gold (and their mountain) back. On the way there they get into all kinds of adventures, with trolls, elves, humans and goblins, and of course when they get to the mountain, things aren't easy either.
Like I said, I am really glad I gave this book another chance, because I loved it. I loved the writing style of Tolkien. It read like a story being told out loud, by a fire, on a cold winters day. I loved the semi-self contained adventures, and how the narrator tries to reassure us that all will be well. I loved Bilbo, who is a very reluctant hero. The dwarfs were great too, all characters had their own quirks that were also useful to the story. And I loved the adventure, the journey, the land. I felt that the events that happened when they got to the mountain were rushed, but maybe that was because I didn't want the book to end. It seems to me this is also a great book to read to (older) children, more so that LotR. Five out of five stars.

I need to read The Hobbit this year, I have fond memories of it being read to me at primary school but I haven't touched it since. Going to be interesting to see how my memory compares.

10 cm left over? Hopefully you have fixed that up by now!

I am also a novice Discworld reader. I have listened to the audio versions of 4 of them (Mort being my favourite), and constantly wish that I could have enough time to read/listen to the whole series!

Not quite yet, can you believe I am trying to control myself? Mainly because I still have muscle cramps from filling them up and I don't want to find a great book with an A-author... I don't want to move over everything. When I was filling them up I had to do that twice when I found more books scattered through the house... quite a task indeed!

Book #45: The Book of Summers by Emylia Hall (17-04-2012 - 19-04-2012)
Note: I received an Advance Reading Copy of this book through the You Review program of The American Book Centre.

'The Book of Summers' is the first book by Emylia Hall, the story of Beth/Erszi getting to grips with her past and her family history because of the unexpected arrival of a parcel from Hungary.

Beth is living in London, working in a gallery, and hardly has a relationship with her father. So when he wants to come and visit her, she is curious to know why. When he comes, he gives her a parcel, which has been sent to his house, from Hungary. This causes a bit of drama because their agreement is that everything that comes from Hungary is ignored. But she can't help herself, so Beth opens the parcel and discovers The Book of Summers, a scrapbook of the seven summers she spent in Hungary from when she was ten years old. This scrapbook forces her to remember these summers, and what happened the last summer she spent there. This event, which is not revealed until nearly the end of the book, is what caused the total silence of Beth and her father on the subject of Hungary and who lives there. The scrapbook, and the news that comes with it, makes Beth look at the events of her teenage years differently, with new appreciation for why her family did what they did.

For me, it is hard to decide what I think about the book, because I feel differently about the story than the writing. Let's start with the negative, the writing. Especially in the beginning of the book, I was very distracted by the descriptive writing. It felt like the writer was trying too hard to describe everything, even things that I thought was unnecessary for the story, to evoke a mood. It felt forced. It seemed that every scene that was set had something in it that made Beth (even the young Beth) think something very profound. For me, this felt unreal, especially with the younger Beth. But, when I got used to the writing style and the tempo of the story, I got sucked into it. Actually, after a few chapters, I liked the slow pace, one summer a chapter. It emphasized how Beth lived for those summers, making the climax that more dramatic. I was very curious about what the big event that changed everything would be. I was shocked when I read that part, and for me, it was the 'right' event, the 'right' climax of the story. The story made sense to me then, and that's when I loved it instead of just liking it. As far as ratings go, I am giving it a four out of five stars.

Hi, Sara! I lost your thread for a time but now have found it, 100 or so posts behind (so it'll take me awhile to catch up). A quick skim-through, though, shows you've been reading some really interesting looking books (some that I have read and loved)! Glad to know you enjoyed Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children as I just bought the book yesterday while I was at the L.A. Times Festival of Books (after attending a panel on which the author sat).

Welcome back!



Book #46: Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood (19-04-2012 / 24-04-2012)
I was first introduced to Margaret Atwood when I read 'The Handmaid's Tale' a couple of years ago. This is of course a science fiction like dystopian novel, as are two of her other books I have read since ('Oryx & Crake' and 'Year of the Flood'). I have read some 'regular' (or more regular) fiction since, but somehow I like those dystopian novels best, and I am always a bit reluctant to read her other works. But now I think I need to get over that, because I have just read Alias Grace, a historical fiction work, and I loved it.
Alias Grace is the story of Grace Marks, a Canadian girl who was convicted of murder in Canada in 1843. We meet Grace in Kingston Penitentiary. She is trusted up to a certain point by the Governor of the prison, and is allowed to work as a maid in his home. One day a doctor arrives, Simon Jordan, who is sent to investigate Grace, her mental health and her supposed innocence with regards to the murder. The story is the story told by Grace to Simon, and Simon's life in Kingston. All through the novel you are left wondering how this nice girl, who seems so quiet, can have done what she is convicted of.
I loved this story, the questions it raises with Simon, and with us, the readers. Because Grace sounds so nice when she is describing her life, I was automatically sympathetic to her innocence, however later parts in the book made me doubt it more and more. I liked the way Atwood brought this all to a conclusion. Another aspect of this book that I loved was the language. The voice really changed between the narrator, Grace, Simon and the other characters. And to me, the language felt nineteenth century to me. It was also refreshing to have a book set in Canada instead of the US and UK like most books I read. I couldn't put this book down, and give it four out of five stars.

Because of our honeymoon I didn't do the March stats, so this is a combination of March and April:

March & April stats:

Read: March =10, April = 8

Fiction: 18

English: 9
Dutch: 9

Ratings:
1 star: 0
2 stars: 0
3 stars: 6
4 stars: 11
5 stars: 1

Books bought: 39
From bookshop: 19 (including souvenir books from the trip)
Second-hand: 8
Free: 12

TBR at the start of the year: 363
TBR at the start of the month: 391
TBR at the end of the month: 389

Like I predicted, I didn't get much reading done the last two months because of our wedding and honeymoon. I mostly read simple stuff, stuff that didn't require too much thinking. That is why the ratings are a bit lower this month. No big books, and I don't know if that will happen this month either, because I just want to read a lot of different things. The books bought were souvenir books, craft books and travel guides. Second-hand books were mostly science-fiction, and the free books were one gift and free from work.

Congrats and I hope you had a lovely time in Japan.

It was quite an adventure. We saw beautiful things, had a great time, but we were happy to be home. And the wedding was everything we wanted it to be :D

Book #47: The Tainted Relic by The Medieval Murderers (25-04-2012 / 02-05-2012)
The Medieval Murderers are a group of historical fiction crime writers who have banded together to talk about their work, and later write books. This book is written by Bernard Knight (with his character of Crowner John in the 12th century), Ian Morson (with his character of William Falconer in 13th century Oxford), Michael Jecks (with his character of Sir Baldwin Furnshill in 14th century Exeter), Susanna Gregory (with her characters of Michael and Bartholomew in 14th century Cambridge) and Philip Gooden (with his character of Nick Revell in 16th century London).
The stories of all these writers are tied together by one common theme, the tainted relic. The relic in this story is a piece of the true cross, in a glass vial in a wooden box. In the 12th century a knight is handed the relic in Jerusalem during the First Crusade. It is a cursed relic, meaning that anyone who touches the piece and lets it out of his possession dies. This leads to interesting cases for all investigators through the ages.
The writing styles of all writers can be pretty different (changing point of view, third person or first person, main investigator or friend), and I liked some more than others. The same goes for the time period, locale, and people in the story. The only two writers I have read outside of The Medieval Murderers' books are Susanna Gregory and Michael Jecks. The other three appeal a bit less to me because of that, because I don't know more about the characters and they don't have room to give more of a back story. The stories all flowed together really well, and all stayed true to the main story line. I liked the epilogue in our time, to pull the story out of the middle ages/Elizabethan times and show that it still has power, even though we don't know it. All in all three out of five stars.

Book #48: Emigranten voor Utopia/The Black Corridor by Michael Moorcock (02-05-2012)
This is a pretty short science fiction book, taking place in two time periods. The main story line is the story of Ryan and twelve travel companions, traveling through space for Munchen 15040. His companions are in suspended animation, and he has been captaining the ship alone for years. While he is slowly losing mind, he remembers how they came to leave earth. At the beginning of the twenty-first century Earth descents into chaos. People are paranoid because of over population. All foreigners are kicked out of England, and slowly the people turn on themselves. Paranoia is huge, forcing people to stay in their houses, not have contact with each other and sleep most of their days away.
The book flips between Ryan on the ship, and his flashbacks of life before they left Earth. There is no clean separation between the two, and it gets more confusing as the story goes on, as Ryan gets more confused. Because of the confusing lines in the story, at the end, you don't know what is real and what is paranoid delusion. Is Ryan really alone? Are the rest of the travelers really 'asleep'? And did they even leave? Despite the book not being very clear, and the ending very vague, I really liked the story, because it conveyed the emotions very well. Four out of five stars.

Book #49: Barst in de hemel/Earthjacket by Jon Hartridge (02-05-2012 / 03-05-2012)
Most of my old science fiction books come from second-hand (charity) shops. This means I don't pay much (a lot less than in a second-hand bookshop), and I find things that haven't been in print in years. Some known works, but the book I just read seems to have been forgotten. You can find second-hand copies, but there aren't many reviews (two ratings on Goodreads, none on Librarything). It is Barst in de hemel/Earthjacket by Jon Hartridge.
It is the story of Phillips, a Sleeper. He lives in a (future?) world of Texecs and Sleepers. The Texecs are the elite, who live with 100% oxygen in a protected city. The Sleepers are kept in the background, and get a lot less oxygen. They are also fed a drug to make them sleep 16 hours or more a day, and given happy vivid dreams to keep them happy. But Phillips experiences a nightmare, and escapes. The Texecs in his city decide that he has potential, and start training him to become a Texec himself. With more oxygen, better food and drink and education, Phillips soon starts to realize what the place of the Sleepers really is. During the story he tries his best to improve the place of the Sleepers, which is made difficult not only by the Texecs, but also of his ignorance of the Texec society. Slowly he learns, he acts, and tries his best.
When reading older science fiction stories (this one is from 1970) it is hard to review them based on the originality of the ideas. I have seen all the ideas (secluded cities, sleeping people, transportation through tubes, future earth) before in other books and movies. When reading this book I was constantly reminded of these other stories, but that doesn't mean that this story disappoints. It all pulls together well. The only thing I didn't like were the flash-forwards ("I am glad I didn't know then how evil he was"). I like to find out these things for myself, and be surprised by them. The ending was a bit open, but optimistic. A very nice find and a good read. Four out of five stars.

Book #50: This Immortal by Roger Zelazny (03-05-2012 / 06-05-2012)
This is a Hugo winning novel by Roger Zelazny, formerly serialized and also known as "...and call me Conrad". The setting is a future Earth, devastated by nuclear war. An alien race, known as the Vegans, offered shelter to humankind when it needed it, and as a result humans are their workforce, and the Vegans own the Earth for leisure purposes. On the Earth itself a mere 4 million humans remain, as well as various mutated lifeforms due to all the radiation. Conrad is the narrator, a man with a long and indeterminate past who is the Commissioner dealing with Art and History of Earth. He is commanded to take a famous Vegan on a tour of Earth, because the Vegan is writing a book. Reluctantly Conrad does so, taking him to Egypt and to Greece (where Conrad is from). Along the way everybody in the tour party suspects that the Vegan is planning something for the Earth, but if this is good or bad for humanity remains unclear and he is unwilling to show.
This book has many elements, now that I am writing this review, I think back and remember the many things going on. It has a perilous journey, ancient mythology, humankind's fight for survival, aliens, love, intrigue. And all that in a mere 187 pages (my 1968 Panther edition). I could not put the book down, and wasn't even that disappointed with the quick ending and all the questions I still had. If the book had been written today, I bet it would have been 500+ pages, but this was short and sweet and leaves something to be imagined. Four out of five stars.

Book #51: Star Maker by Olaf Stapledon (06-05-2012 / 08-05-2012)
I had heard of Olaf Stapledon before, I even have another book by him, but I had never read anything by him before. Last weekend I found an SF Masterworks edition of Star Maker. I always buy SF Masterworks books (if I don't already have them, of course), because I am sure they must be pretty good or influential to be in that series. And as before, I wasn't disappointed.
This is not your average science fiction novel. I am not even sure it falls in that genre, it could also be philosophical, almost religious literature. The story is told by a man, who, in the late 1930s, sits outside his house in England, and then starts on a (mental) journey through time and space. He travels (no ship, inventions, crew or anything, just his mind) through the galaxy and along the way he grows. He lives a while in the head of an alien (Other Human), and then travels mentally further along. Along his journey he grows and is joined by other mental travelers from other planets and periods. Together they (as one unit) discover how aliens/creatures/humans evolve and survive. They discover the same types of crises in all societies, and when a society can grow beyond it, the species can evolve. The main movement is towards mental peace, togetherness and unity. First between countries, then planets, galaxies, the universe. The last stage is towards the Star Maker, the unknown creator.
Like I said, the book is pretty philosophical, and the language used takes some getting used to. It is pretty clear which way the story is going, what Stapledon is thinking, but that is ok. Realizing this book was written in 1937, just before World War II makes some references to Earth even more real. This is simply one amazing book, an absolute must read for so many reasons. Four out of five stars.

Book #52: Lang na middernacht/Long after Midnight by Ray Bradbury (08-05-2012/09-05-2012)
This is a short story collection by Ray Bradbury. I know Bradbury from Fahrenheit 451, a dystopian/science fiction novel that I thought was brilliant. This collection mostly contains non-science fiction, non-futuristic stories, some with a weird element. I always find it difficult to review story collections, and this one is no different. The stories were enjoyable, some even good, but all in all... meh. Entertaining, but not brilliant. Three out of five stars.

Book #53: Way Station by Clifford D. Simak (10-05-2012 / 13-05-2012)
I picked up Way Station by Clifford D. Simak because it won a Hugo and a Nebula award, which I take for a good sign of good science fiction. I am trying to collect and read all Hugo winners to introduce myself to (older Science Fiction). With this book, I wasn't disappointed, what a good book.
The Way Station is a house on earth, in rural America. In it lives Enoch Wallace, who appears to be immortal. This draws the interest of the United States government. This is how we are introduced to Enoch. The story has several story-lines, one of which is the government watching Wallace. Another is Wallace in his Way Station, a stop along the intergalactic travel highway. He meets all kinds of aliens, gets all kinds of gifts, but cannot tell anybody because the Earth is not part of the galactic federation. Meanwhile Earth is moving towards another (nuclear war). And close by lives a backward family with a mute girl for a daughter, who Wallace is charmed by and meets in the woods a lot. In the end all the story lines come together in a great climax that resolves everything, and makes Wallace choose between Earth, and the galaxy. Where does he belong?
Even though the book is really short compared to the sci-fi published today (189 pages in my 1976 edition), it manages to pack this all in without feeling rushed. Also, the story itself doesn't feel that dated. Many ideas come back in later books, movies and TV shows, but still feel new. Great stuff, highly recommended, four out of five stars.

Book #54: De zwerver/The Wanderer by Fritz Leiber (13-05-2012 / 16-05-2012)
In my effort to collect and read all Hugo award-winning novels the latest book I read was The Wanderer/Zwerver by Fritz Lieber. The book was first published in 1964, my edition is the Dutch translation published in 1987.
It is the future, and both the US and Russia have a permanent base on the moon. The wife of one of the astronauts on the moon and his best friend are watching the total lunar eclipse when suddenly a new planet appears in the sky out of nowhere. The planet, and its gravity cause disaster on the earth (earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, flooding) and on the moon. The book is the story of many people on earth and on the moon dealing with the appearance of the planet and the disasters surrounding it. It is a mix of a dystopian world (every man is fending for himself) and first contact (who are the aliens on that planet? why are they there?).
The book was an entertaining read. Yeah, some of the events are pretty coincidental, and some are far-fetched. Not all characters (most actually) were necessary, and I would have enjoyed reading more about the aliens and their history. But especially the fact that I have just read Star Maker, and the book starts with a quote from that book, and borrows from the world building in that story it connected for me. It gave me an extra episode in the Star Maker world, a focus on one small event that could have happened in that universe. Entertaining, four out of five stars.



Book #55: We by Yevgeny Zamyatin (17-05-2012 / 21-05-2012)
Ever since discovering the great website Worlds Without End (about science fiction and fantasy novels) I have looked at science fiction award winners and classics to give myself a beter base for my science fiction reading. One of the books I kept running into was 'We' by Yevgeny Zamyatin, a book I honestly didn't know before. Reading the description on the back ("In the One State of the great Benefactor, there are no individuals, only numbers. Life is an ongoing process of mathematical precision, a perfectly balanced equation. Primitive passions and instincts have been subdued. Even nature has been defeated, banished behind the Green Wall.") it sounds familiar, reminding me of 'Brave New World' and '1984'. 'We' is older though, a few years older than 'Brave New World'. It is a dystopian vision of a future earth.
We follow D503, a man and a builder of the 'Integral', a space ship the One State is building to spread their philosophy of happiness through total control. He meets I330, a woman who doesn't follow the strict rules of the society. Slowly D503 discovers another side to the society, and he starts to suffer from imagination and having a soul. The book is a report/diary kept by D503 of the days before the launch of the 'Integral', where he tries to explain his society for those living on Mars or Venus, those the 'Integral' might meet.
The novel sometimes reads a stream of consciousness, sometimes as a calm explanation of society in the One State. This reflects the inner state of D503, but it takes some getting used to, because the emotions he experiences can be strange to us readers. In the end because D503 doesn't know or understands everything, neither do we. But that doesn't matter, it is a very gripping story to read, and it is clear to see where later writers have gotten inspired. Four out of five stories.

Way Station is one of my very favorite classic science fiction books--I'm glad you enjoyed it as well!

Book #56: Persuasion by Jane Austen (21-05-2012 / 23-05-2012)
Besides buying a lot of (second-hand) books, I also enter a lot of competitions for books I am interested in. A couple of weeks ago I won a wonderful publication of Jane Austen's Persuasion from Penguin's new Penguin English Library series/editions. It is a simple edition, with a short essay in the back but no footnotes.
In short, Persuasion is the story of Anne Elliot who has given up an engagement to Frederick Wentworth because he is too low and poor for her. Seven years later, he is a wealthy Captain in the navy, but hurt by Anne before, he hardly gives her the time of day. Anne still loves him, and cannot help but hope to win him back. All this takes place in England in the early nineteenth century, in big houses, snooty families, Bath, as we are used to with Jane Austen.
What can I say to review this novel that hasn't been said before? If you like Jane Austen, as I do, and you can get into the language and mannerisms of the day, you'll like this book. It is short and not with as much humor as Pride and Prejudice, but still a fun read. The ending is predictable, and not all story-lines are ended that neatly, but that doesn't matter in a book of nearly 200 years old. Four out of five stars.

Book #57: Nocturnes by Kazuo Ishiguro (23-05-2012)
Nocturnes is a short story collection by Kazuo Ishiguro. The five stories in this book all revolve around music, and love. Some stories overlap, the characters appear in more than one story. There is a story about a young musician in Venice who meets an old crooner, his mother's idol, who asks him to help him serenade his wife. There is a saxophone player who is brilliant but not good-looking trying to make it. There is a young cello player who just came from his training, and is learning in the real world. There are friends who enjoy old music together but grow up. And there is a story about a young guitar player who meets two older musicians.
The main themes are obviously music, but also age, and love. And the question, what does age do to love? The stories were very enjoyable and interesting to read, and it was nice to see some recurring characters. Four out of five stars.



Book #58: Stalen jongens, felle knapen by Richard Matheson (24-05-2012)
As a short quick read I read this short story collection by Richard Matheson. Before I started collecting more and more science fiction books, I only knew him from I Am Legend, but when you read collections like this you realize he has written many stories that were the inspiration for movies. The funny thing is, I never know this before hand, so I read something, think it sounds familiar, look it up, and sure enough, the story was the inspiration for...
I always find it hard to review a collection. Overall I liked this book, the stories were short but good. The stories gave just enough of a creep or inspiration to make you think about them. The stories that I recognized from movies en TV were "Steel" (Real Steel) and "Nightmare at 20.000 feet" (the famous Twilight Zone episode about the guy on the airplane wing that only William Shatner sees). Other gems were "Through Channels" (reminding me of a Doctor Who episode) and "When the Waker Sleeps". A great writer, good stories, four out of five stars.



Book #59: Bring up the Bodies by Hillary Mantel (25-05-2012 / 28-05-2012)
In 2009 I, like many others, read 'Wolf Hall' by Hillary Mantel. 'Wolf Hall' is the story of Thomas Cromwell as seen from his point of view, when he is making the marriage of King Henry VIII to Anne Boleyn possible. This book, 'Bring up the Bodies', is the sequel, when Henry is getting tired of Anne and wants to marry Jane Seymour.
The story is told from Thomas Cromwell's side, and unlike most other books and sources, he seems a good man, who just does what he is paid for, and what he feels is necessary for the country. In the book many famous historical figures, like Henry VIII, Anne Boleyn, Thomas Cranmer, Jane Seymour and Thomas Howard. The story itself isn't much of a surprise, what makes this book special is the writing. There was much complaint about the writing in 'Wolf Hall', where it was sometimes difficult to see who was saying what and the story just rambled a long. I feel this is much improved in this book, although I can't say I was that bothered with it in 'Wolf Hall'. Now sometimes extra emphasis is placed on who is saying something ("he, Thomas Cromwell"). The conversations are still fast flowing, but that is what makes the book fun. When the gentlemen are scheming on how to deal with political enemies and friends and how to survive themselves, I just love this book. The best part was when I read the sentence that explains the title, I just feel that was brilliant, because while it is only a small scene at the ending of the story, it does describe the whole thing in a few words. If you liked Wolf Hall, you'll like this, if you hated the writing in Wolf Hall, maybe try this one. Five out of five stars.



Book #60: Trullion: Sterrenwereld 2262/Trullion: Alastor 2262 by Jack Vance (29-05-2012 / 30-05-2012)
When I was younger I read some Jack Vance books from my dad. Although I have read a lot of science fiction this past year, and although I have his Jack Vance books, I haven't read anything by him for years. 'Trullion: Sterrenwereld/Alastor 2262' is the first book I picked up, purely by chance.
It is the story of Glinnes Hulden, a man who lives on Trullion, one of the many planets in the Alastor cluster. The planet is peaceful, man doesn't have to work much and just enjoys a simple life. Glinnes returns after ten years in the Whelm, the interplanetary army, to find that his father and brother are dead or missing, and his younger brother is not taking good care of the family estate. What follows is a story about sport, and an adventure with pirates, a sect, stolen money and dangerous gypsies.
I have to be honest, while the writing is alright, the world is nice, I just didn't like this book. Too much sport (and too detailed) and an adventure that just seems to happen. The story-lines wander around, like Vance had a list of things he wanted in this book, and when he didn't know what to put on the next page, he thought to himself "Oh, pirates!" or "Oh, a new match!". Three out of five stars.

May stats:

Read: 14

Fiction: 14

English: 8
Dutch: 6

Ratings:
1 star: 0
2 stars: 0
3 stars: 3
4 stars: 10
5 stars: 1

Books bought: 26 (Total)
From bookshop: 2
Second-hand: 14
Free: 10

TBR at the start of the year: 363
TBR at the start of the month: 389
TBR at the end of the month: 396

I got back into my normal reading pattern again. A lot of science fiction but also some historical fiction (Bring up the Bodies, yay!). But next month I will read a big book, I am sure. I am so sure because I have already finished it :D, The Confusion by Neal Stephenson. The book buying was with two vouchers at my favorite store (ABC. I got some very cheap second-hand books (One of our second-hand shops has a 3 for €0,50 deal) and some great free books at work.

Book #61: The Confusion by Neal Stephenson (30-05-2012 / 09-06-2012)
Two years ago I read Quicksilver by Neal Stephenson, the first of three books (in my editions) of The Baroque cycle. It took me two weeks, I loved it, but somehow I didn’t have the courage to pick up part two, The Confusion, even though I bought it right after finishing the first book. With my resolution to read more ‘big’ books this year, I just jumped in, and I am so glad I did.
It is hard to give a summary of this book, because it is so dense, and has so much, and every detail seems to be important and comes back later on to influence somebody else on the other side of the world. What I can say is that it is the end of the seventeenth century, and that the book focusses on Eliza and Jack, only mentioning Daniel in passing. Jack is a slave on a Corsairs ship, and Eliza has lost everything and is in trouble in French for being a suspected English spy for William of Orange. In my edition both their books are woven into each other, which makes for great reading and a fast-moving story.
What I love is how historical events (the war between England and France dealing with the succession and who should be on the English and later Spanish thrones) and the worldwide adventures. I don’t want to spoil too much, but both Jack and Eliza travel around, showing us, the readers, a lot of the world in the seventeenth/eighteenth century. I also love how they both weave intricate plots that take years and years to come to fruition. They are unclear in the beginning, but then, when it happens, I really appreciated the brilliance that is Neal Stephenson. You need to invest in this book (time, energy) but it is so worth it. Five out of five stars.

Love the Richard Matheson cover :)

I have always shied away from reading Neil Stephenson, books like Anathem really entice me.. maybe I should try is history

Love your bookshelf!!

Thanks for The Confusion review divine nanny, I have had the 3 books sitting on the shelf for a few years, must get to them soon !

All I can say is do not be intimidated by the size and subjects of Neal's books, be it dystopian future/earth-like planet in Anathem (I LOVE that book) or history in The Baroque Cycle. They are clever, and I love them. They are so worth the time it takes to read them.

Book #62: The System of the World by Neal Stephenson (09-06-2012 / 19-06-2012)
After reading "The Confusion" last week I moved right on to the last book in the "The Baroque" cycle, "The System of The World". This is the book where it all comes together, the long and winding stories of Daniel Waterhouse, Isaac Newton, Jack Shaftoe and Eliza. The main character in this book is Daniel, who has been called back to England from America by Sophia Charlotte of Hanover. Jack is a coiner making false coins out of special gold, Newton is Master of the Mint but also an Alchemist. Queen Anne wants her successor to be Catholic, the Whigs want it to be George of the House of Hanover, a protestant.
The book is, as those before it, very detailed, very dense, with many characters, story-lines and politics. There is really no way to write a summary of suck a complex story. Another reason for no summary is that anything said about this book would spoil the other two books. I loved this book, as I loved the rest of the series. If you liked the other two (which you need to read to get this book), you'll like this one. If not, you won't. For me this is five out of five stars.



Book #63: The Prisoner of Zenda by Anthony Hope (19-06-2012 / 20-06-2012)
A couple of years ago Penguin released a (beautiful) series of Classic Boys' Adventures. I got a few of the books (Tarzan, She, The Lost World) before they disappeared from the bookstores again. Last week I found one of the books from the series I didn't have yet, in a different version, 'The Prisoner of Zenda'.
Rudolf Rassendyll is a well-to-do English gentleman who doesn't want to work or do anything. In his family he is the odd one out, with red hair, because of an affair one of his ancestors had with a royal from Ruritania. He decides to find out his heritage and travels in secret to Ruritania, where it turns out he looks exactly like the king who will be crowned the day after he arrives. His similarity to the king leads to a big plot by the king's evil brother, Black Michael. The book covers a big adventure to save Ruritania from Black Michael, all while falling in love, fighting with swords and guns.
The book is a true adventure, a bit more geared towards boys than the other books in the Penguin series, and because of that a bit less interesting for me. But it was an enjoyable adventure to read, so three out of five stars.

Oh, but the romance!! Bound to tug the hearts of us gals! I loved The Prisoner of Zenda as an adolescent, and still do. There is a homage to it by Sherwood Smith, called Coronets and Steel, that is quite worth reading, more of an urban fantasy but with that lost kingdom feel to it.

And I didn't comment at the time, but I'm so glad you enjoyed one of my favorite classics, Way Station.

Haha, I am sure. I guess I wasn't in the right mind, or, gasp, I am too old. I can see this book appealing to a younger crowd.



Book #64: Frankenstein Unbound by Brian Aldiss (20-06-2012 / 21-06-2012)
This is a short retelling of the Frankenstein story by Brian Aldiss. It is the future, and due to nuclear war space itself is unraveling, causing timeslips. This makes the main character, Joe, ends up in Switzerland in the 1800s. There he ends up in the story of Frankenstein and his monster, meeting Dr. Frankenstein himself. Knowing this is all fiction, he is confused (and so was I), especially after he also meets Lord Byron, Percy and Mary Shelley. On top of that, timeslips keep happening, causing Joe to lose days of time.
All this is stuffed into a pretty short book (157 pages in my 1975 edition), and you get a story that has great potential, but is very confusing. Three out of five stars.



Book #65: Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter by Seth Grahame-Smith (22-06-2012 / 26-06-2012)
A few years ago a new genre arrived on the book scene, where vampires, zombies and other supernatural monsters were merged into classic stories like Pride and Prejudice. And then a mix of real history, and big historical characters and the supernatural was the logical next step. And that's how I came to read Queen Victoria: Demon Hunter, and why I have recently picked up Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.
This is a (short) biography of Abraham Lincoln, mixing his real life story and family and friends into a story of vampires playing a big role in the history of America as a new country.The story starts with the writer, Seth Grahame-Smith, meeting a stranger who gives him a set of diaries. Those diaries turn out to be written by Abraham Lincoln. It starts in his youth, when he is greatly affected by the death of his mother and the inaction of his father. He meets a vampire, and when killing his first one he receives help that makes it possible for him to train and become the best vampire hunter of the new United States. He uncovers the hidden history of the vampire's influence in the country, and is determined to fight for humanity.
I bought this book because I needed some entertainment that didn't need too much thinking, and this book gave me exactly what I needed. If you've read books in this genre before, you know the set-up. It isn't a masterpiece, it is just fun. And it has made me want to read more about Lincoln (the real one). The last chapter was a nice addition and opens the door for more (I hope!). Four out of five stars.

Book #66: The City And The Stars; The Deep Range; A Fall of Moondust; Rendezvous with Rama by Arthur C. Clarke (26-06-2012 / 09-07-2012)
This is a Book Club Associates edition with four of Arthur C. Clarke’s books: The City And The Stars; The Deep Range; A Fall of Moondust; Rendezvous with Rama. I read a separate edition of The City And The Stars in the beginning of the year, so I skipped over that one. The book as a total gets four out of five stars.
The Deep Range
In the not so far future, humankind found a way to regulate ocean life in such a way that it is a practical food source for the billions of humans on earth. Whales are held as cattle in the Great Barrier Reef, and plankton is another source of food, farmed like a crop. This is the background of the story of Walter Franklin. Traumatized and after a year of therapy, he arrives at the Warden training centre where he meets Don. He gets a crash course into being a Warden for the whales, and turns out to be a natural at it. The rest of the story is the story of Franklin, about his work, his personal life and his trauma.
It is a pretty nice story, a bit moralistic about the eating of animals, but nice. Nothing special. Three out of five stars.
A Fall of Moondust
Humankind has made it to the moon and beyond. The story starts with tourists on the boat Selene, sailing the Sea of Thirst on the moon. It is not filled with water, but with dust, dust that acts somewhat like a fluid. Captain Pat Harris has made the trip many times before, and expects no surprises. Until a once in a million earthquake happens right under the Sea, and Selene sinks. Without anyway to reach the outside world, and without any visible traces of what happened to them, will they be saved? And how?
This story is a lot more suspenseful and even though I had an inkling on how it would end, I couldn’t put the book down. A very entertaining read. Four out of five stars.
Rendezvous with Rama
It’s 2130, and a strange asteroid is discovered approaching Earth. Earth, and the rest of the inhabited planets and satellites, soon discover that this is no asteroid, but a made object, which has travelled for millions of years and is aiming for the sun. They send a ship to the object, named Rama, to explore. The story follows the crew of the ship Endeavor as they enter Rama and try to discover and survive that alien environment.
The story is inspirational and a very good read, I understand why it won the Hugo and the Nebula awards. All I want now is to know more about Rama and the why, what and who of the story. Four out of five stars.

June stats:

Read: 5

Fiction: 5

English: 5
Dutch: 0

Ratings:
1 star: 0
2 stars: 0
3 stars: 2
4 stars: 1
5 stars: 2

Books bought: 3 (Total)
From bookshop: 2
Second-hand: 1
Free: 12

TBR at the start of the year: 363
TBR at the start of the month: 396
TBR at the end of the month: 398

This month I decided to stop comparing my reading speed with that of last year. I don't think I'll make my unofficial goal of 150 books, but I will stick to 100 books as a goal. There is just too much happening this year that interferes with my reading (marriage, honeymoon, looking for a new job, moving for a new job). This month I only read 5 books, which for me is so little. But I read two huge works, the last two parts in The Baroque Cycle and I am so happy I did. I also read a few entertaining books, and at the end of the month I started another bigger one, a collection of four books by Arthur C. Clarke.

Book #67: The Surgeon of Crowthorne by Simon Winchester (10-07-2012/11-07-2012)
This is my 67th book of the year, and up until now, they have all been fiction books. But the thing is, I love non-fiction, I just have to put a bit more energy into reading them. So, last year I picked a couple of Simon Winchester’s books (Atlantic and The Surgeon of Crowthorne) while looking for his book Krakatoa (which I didn’t find). I just finished The Surgeon of Crowthorne (known in the US as The Professor and the Madman), and enjoyed it very much.
This is the story of Dr. W.C. Minor, an American surgeon and Sir James Murray, editor of the Oxford English Dictionary, and the creation of that great work. The book is based on a few facts. Minor was one of the most prolific contributors to the OED, and he was in correspondence with Murray for years, all the while being locked up in Broadmoor for murdering a man and being insane. Step by step Winchester dissects the story, by diving into the life stories of Minor and Murray, into Minor’s insanity, into care for patients with mental disorders in Victorian times, into the history of dictionaries, into the history of the OED etc. In each chapter he explores an element in detail, placing it in its time and place and explaining all he can about it.
And that’s what I really liked about this book. Anytime some fact came by which I would want to know more about, Winchester explained and elaborated upon it. This did make the book a bit hard to follow sometimes, you are jumping from time period to time period and subject to subject, but when reading it in (nearly) one go, it is the best way to have it presented to you. Four out of five stars.

Book #68: One Blood by Qwantu Amaru (11-07-2012 / 13-07-2012)
Note: I received an Advance Reading Copy of this book through the Early Reviewer program of LibraryThing.

This is the story of many characters, all having lives that are intertwined more than they know themselves. There is the white governor of Louisiana and his wife and children. The deceased (murdered?) first black mayor and his wife, now with another man who strives for black power and is into Voodoo. A baby given up for adoption. A psychic who is also into Voodoo and her daughter. And all will find out the ties that bind them when the governor’s daughter is kidnapped. Is this because of the curse that follows the governor’s family around through the ages? And how can it be stopped?

I enjoyed reading the book, although it could have been better. The story keeps jumping in time, to roughly three time-periods, to explain the characters. For me, this made it all a bit confusing, although I understand why the author chose to reveal his story a small step at a time. The two main themes where racial politics and Voodoo, starting with the first and ending with the latter. Both aren’t familiar to me from my own experiences, so all I know is from books and TV. Probably because of this I had to put some extra effort into following the story, and trying to keep track of who was what race and had which goal in mind. The Voodoo I just followed along with, but it could have done with a bit more back story and follow-up.

The ending was pretty chaotic, and like other reviewers have said, I can see it as a movie. As for the book, it was pretty hard to follow in some places, to keep track of who is where and doing what. There are also still many story-lines open (or at least that is how it feels, looking back). All in all an entertaining novel, pretty violent and with supernatural elements, three out of five stars.

@160 Nice review btw... I do like Simon Winchester although sometimes he skirts being slightly too dry for my taste his books always end up interesting.

Oh I am way behind again!



Book #69: Very Good, Jeeves! by P.G. Wodehouse (14-07-2012 / 16-07-2012)
Recently H. and I have watched the fantastic Hugh Laurie and Stephen Fry series Jeeves and Wooster, based on the books by P. G. Wodehouse. The books had been recommended to me years ago by a friend, but even though I picked up a whole pile of them for free, I hadn't read any yet. But now I couldn't resist, and I just had to read a Jeeves and Wooster book. Luckily for me, the only English Wodehouse I have is the first one (in my collection, not in the series). The rest of the books are in Dutch, and miss some of that British charm, I'm sure. However, this first book was in English (glorious English) and so much fun.
The book itself has several short stories dealing with the adventures of Wooster and Jeeves' inevitable rescue. I was pleasantly surprised that the dialogue in the series comes so close to the stories in the book. The stories are all told from Bertie's standpoint, which makes them even more fun to read. Some of the stories in this book have also been featured in episodes of the TV show, so they weren't new to me. With regards to the others, they were very similar, and fun to read. Four out of five stars.

Book #70: Atlantic: A Vast Ocean of a Million Stories by Simon Winchester (16-07-2012 / 25-07-2012)
After reading The Surgeon of Crowthorne a couple of weeks ago, I wanted to more, so I dove into Atlantic: A Vast Ocean of a Million Stories, also by Simon Winchester. This is a book about the Atlantic Ocean, and everything about it. Geology, history, politics, war, discovery, sailing, flying, animals, humans, weather, you name it, it is mentioned. The book is divided into chapters based on life, starting with birth and ending in death. But in those chapters everything can be covered. Sometimes this made the book very chaotic, Winchester followed any lead that he found interesting, sometimes telling something historic, before moving on to biology and then telling an anecdote from his personal travels or relationships. I didn't really like this, and think that it is worse than in The Surgeon of Crowthorne. Maybe this also had to do with my reading mood, I've had trouble finding the time to read and concentrate, which is something this book deserves. Yesterday I got some reading mojo back and read the second half of the book in two sittings. Three out of four stars.

Book #71: Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett (25-07-2012 / 31-07-2012)
I'm still in a bit of a reading-funk, so when I found Good Omens by both Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett, two authors whose work I really like, I couldn't wait to start reading it. And I wasn't disappointed. It is the story of the apocalypse, told from the view-point of an angel and a demon who have lived on earth for a long time, and have become friends. They also kind of like us humans, saying they are capable of greater good and evil without help of heaven and hell than would ever be possible with help. Anyway, the apocalypse is upon us, complete with Antichrist. The Antichrist (the son of the Devil) has been placed with a family, and when he turns eleven... all hell will break loose, quite literally. But, what if he is misplaced? And his upbringing was quite normal (English middle-class)? And why should there even be an apocalypse?
The book is absurd, funny, fast-moving and just all in all fun. If you like absurd humor, if you like Gaiman or Pratchett, if you like not taking religion as seriously as some, then this is the book for you. Four out of five stars.

Book #72: De geïllustreerde man/The Illustrated man by Ray Bradbury
When I picked up this book I though it was one story about the Illustrated Man. Actually, it is a short story collection, built around the man. The man is a man with tattoos, but no ordinary tattoos. The tattoos predict the future, and in the evening they move, telling a story. The scariest tattoo is the one that is blurry, and shows the future death of somebody who has been with the illustrated man for a while.
The stories all take place in the future, with a lot of space-travel and futuristic technology. However, human psychology is always at the center of the story. For example, there is a story about the black people who have colonized Mars because of the terrible treatment they were getting on Earth (in the fifties/sixties). Now a white person has come from Earth to ask for their help after multiple wars have destroyed most of the planet. What will they do to their former tormentors? Another is about a group of astronauts whose ship has been destroyed and who are floating aimlessly through space, waiting to die.
The stories are all very good, and this is a very enjoyable collection. Great science fiction. Four out of five stars.

I didn't really like Atlantic either, which I found so annoying since I'd really enjoyed the other Winchester books I'd read. Sometimes the writing just felt awful, with such overblown metaphors. I think his choice of focus in parts, especially toward the end was odd too.

I'm glad I'm not alone in my criticism of this one! It seemed so odd that I could love a couple of his earlier books and then find this one so BLAH.

time for a Good Omens reread (nice review btw):) & I like the idea for the short stories collection.

July stats:

Read: 6

Fiction: 4
Non-Fiction: 2

English: 6
Dutch: 0

Ratings:
1 star: 0
2 stars: 0
3 stars: 2
4 stars: 4
5 stars: 0

Books bought: 31 (Total)
From bookshop: 1
Second-hand: 16
Free: 14

TBR at the start of the year: 363
TBR at the start of the month: 398
TBR at the end of the month: 390 (not quite sure how this happened, I must have miscalculated last month)

Another slow reading month. I read some non-fiction (by Simon Winchester) which I enjoyed getting back into, and I read some SF. On some level the slow reading pace and small reading funk bothers me (I used to read a book in a couple of days, now it takes at least a week). But then again, it is ok.
I am gathering books at work, we have a free bookcase where colleagues drop of unwanted books. Because I am changing jobs soon, I am taking advantage of the bookcase while I still can. No major reading plans for August, although I have picked up many 1001-list books, so I want to try some of that. And right now I am losing myself in The Wise Man's Fear, in the nice 1107 pages my version has.

I was in a reading funk at the beginning of the year, hated it but sometimes there is nothing you can do. I admit comfort reads and comics helped a bit. Hope it picks up!

I hope it will too, but when I start my new job my main reading spot will be gone: the train on which I spend 3 hours a day commuting to work. My new job I'll probably drive, and audiobooks are not for me... But I am determined to start going to bed on time and reading before going to sleep.

Oh, I'm finally caught up here! I like the sci-fi you've been reading, and sorry to hear about the book funk. Hopefully it won't last long!

oh good luck in your new job, hope its not a long drive! I agree I cannot get into audio books, radio plays maybe, but I find other people reading books too slow and too off putting.

Glad you liked one of my favorites, Good Omens!

Book #73: Heer van het Licht/Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny (04-08-2012 / 08-08-2012)
I bought this book because it is one of the Hugo winners, and I am (still) on a mission to read all winners. Sometimes you come across a book that is just outside of what you would normally read, and Lord of Light is one of those books. The reason I would never pick this up without its Hugo winner status is that it is about (earth, existing) religion. But then again, it is also not really about religion, so I am happy I read it.
The story is about (space?) travelers that have colonized a world much like our own, hoarding and refining their technology and structuring their organization like a pantheon of (Hindu) gods. Existing species are classified as demons, the offspring of the original (godlike) colonists are the subjects. The main character is Sam, or Buddha, who used to be one of the gods but is now fighting against them. There are several other fallen gods that are in the war with him, both on his side and not. The book cover an undefined span of time, and jumps from story to story covering the fights between the gods and Sam.
Because of the jumps in time and the reincarnations (transfer of the soul into a new body electronically) I found it very hard to follow the story and to get into it. I get that this is based on the legends/myths/stories around Buddha, but as I don't know these stories well, I didn't have that connection as a guideline either. For that reason it took me a while to get into the book. But after a while I did get hooked, and I enjoyed reading the stories for what they were. I would have liked to know more about the colonists/gods, their technology and their back story, so the style of the book as a myth didn't really appeal to me. Still, three out of five stars.

Book #74: The Wise Man's Fear by Patrick Rothfuss (08-08-2012 / 22-08-2012)
I read The Name of the Wind because of this comic by Greg Dean about its sequel, The Wise Man's Fear. I loved the book nearly as much as Dean did, so I couldn't wait to pick up the sequel (for cheap ;)). So when I got a gift certificate to my favorite bookstore I picked it up and started right away.
It is the second day of story telling in the inn. In the story Kvothe is still in school, still poor, still banned from the Archives etc. He tells about his school time, his focus on naming, his quest to learn more about the Chandrian, his love for Denna, his way of getting into trouble, his luck of getting out of it, and more. Meanwhile at the inn they are dealing with the aftermath of the attack and Kvothe's sulkiness.
The book did not disappoint. While my memory for books is notoriously bad, I believe this book gave me the same joy when reading it as the first one. Yes, this book is not perfect (many reviews say the same thing, especially this one), but it is fun. I loved it. Five out of five stars.

I've rather liked Zelazny in the past (must admit, I'm a sucker for the Nine Princes in Amber series, even if I have to lock my not-so-inner feminist away as I read it), but I haven't read Lord of Light yet.

And thanks for the reminder - I must get to The Name of the Wind at some stage! Oh, I need to win Lotto so I can spend the rest of my life reading!

Hahaha, same feeling here. My reading has seriously suffered because of work and life stress, and my reviewing is even worse...
I have the Amber series (first 5 at least) on my shelves, just need to get to them, like so many books. I love seeing on LT all the books I get to read in the future from my shelves, but like you, I wish I had more time!

Book #75: The Lurker at the Threshold by H. P. Lovecraft (23-08-2012 / 25-08-2012)
You can't really be on the internet, and miss the influence H. P. Lovecraft has on the shared conscious. Cthulu is being referenced everywhere, from being woken by Gangham Style or being crafted into a cut amigurumi. So, anytime I find a Lovecraft novel cheap, I pick it up, familiarizing myself with the mythos. This is one of those books, although the main writer seems to be August Derleth, Lovecraft's publishing partner at Arkham House, for me it is still a nice addition to my reading of the Cthulhu Mythos.
It is the story of a long abandoned house, a returning heir doing it up, and strange sounds and stories. Ambrose Dewart is the man who is intrigued by the house of his ancestors, and cannot help but ignore the warnings telling him to not disturb anything. When he investigates the strange history of the earlier inhabitants, his ancestors, and the house itself, he is drawn into a horrific repeating history.
The story was a pretty quick read, which I enjoyed very much. It is another small chapter dealing with the Elder Gods, and I cannot wait to read more about them. Four out of five stars.

Book #76: The Mammoth Book of Alternate Histories by Ian Watson (25-08-2012 / 30-08-2012)
I've always been fascinated by alternative history stories, the 'what if's' of history. What if Churchill had been hit by a car before the Second World War? What if Roosevelt hadn't had polio, what if Henry IV hadn't gone to Canossa? So I couldn't help but pick up this collection of stories and novella's of Alternate Histories.
The collection was pretty good. There were some good stories in here, like one about the Roman Empire lasting to the year two thousand (having a serious effect by cancelling out the industrial revolution it seems), or the one about the crew of the Enola Gay dying before dropping the bomb and the replacement bomber refusing to drop the bomb on Hiroshima.
However, reading alternate history requires knowledge about the pivotal change in the story. If I don't know the effects of the bomb on Hiroshima, or the shooting of Franz Ferdinand, it isn't interesting at all from an alternate history point of view to read about a change in this history. Then it is just a story, pretty nice, but it loses its power. This was a problem for me in several of the stories. It was still a fun collection to read, with some nice classics. Four out of five stars.

Book #77: Het einde van het begin/Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clarke (01-09-2012 / 04-09-2012)
Arthur C. Clarke is one of my favorite author's, I like nearly everything he wrote (that I read). So, when I wanted something quick (only 255 pages) and nice to read, I picked up Het einde van het begin (or Childhood's End).
Aliens have come, with great ships hanging over the world's most important cities. But all they want to do is help. They do this by taking over world government. They bring peace, an end to hunger and prosperity for all. But they refuse to show themselves, knowing that in the consciousness of mankind their image is saved up as the manifestation of pure evil. What do the new rules really want? Who are they? And can humankind keep its humanity?
The book covers several periods of time; the arrival of the Overlords, the showing of their bodies, and the end of their plan. This makes the story feels much longer and bigger than it is. Trust Clarke to cover so much in so few pages and still not make it feel rushed. I think this is another Clarke classic, and I am glad I read it. Four out of five stars.

Book #78: De man die zichzelf uitvouwde/The man who folded himself by David Gerrold (05-09-2012)
I picked this book up purely because it is a 70s sci-fi novel, and I love those, most of the time. Later on I read some comments online that this is a pretty weird book with too much weird sex. And I can't say I really disagree with this.
It is the story of Danny, who receives a time-travelling belt from his old uncle who died of old age. He hops through time and slightly alternate universes, mostly spending time with himself and a version of himself. This makes it pretty hard to keep track of the story, as he is constantly travelling backwards and forwards to tell himself things, to party with himself, to help himself. Even for him it gets hard to keep apart sometimes. Like some other reviewers on LibraryThing have said, there is some pretty weird sex in this book (gay sex with himself, threesomes with himselfs, sex with a female version of himself....) and I am not quite sure this was necessary for the book, but whatever. It is an interesting view on time/dimension travelling, and an ok read. Three out of five stars.

So, I just started a new job, which, while it is fun, is pretty stressful and takes up way more of my time than my old job. So, less time for reading. BUT! It was my birthday last week, and today they let me know that they give the birthday girls/guys €40's worth of gift cards to Bol.com (Dutch Amazon). So, FREE BOOKS! I am having a lot of fun already making a list :D

Happy birthday and such a lovely idea at work! I just have to buy everyone else cakes :)

Happy belated birthday, and even happier books ordering with the gift card!

That is an absolutely wonderful birthday perk. Happy belated birthday!

Thanks guys!



Book #79: Transition by Iain M. Banks (05-09-2012 / 24-09-2012)
For a long time I have been addicted to the science fiction books of Iain M. Banks. I knew he wrote 'regular' fiction as Iain Banks, but never tried one of those, until I found out those could be just as weird as his science fiction. So, I put one, Transition, on my wish list, and a couple of weeks ago, I got it as a gift.
This book is a few stories in one, each of which follows a different person. Not only that, but the stories jump in time too. This makes that you might not understand how it all fits together until the end. It is the story of our world as one of many alternate worlds, each slightly different from the rest. There are people who can travel (or flit) between worlds, and these people work for The Concern. These people alter history slightly, to make the world they are on a better place. But not everyone believes this is necessarily a good thing. So we come to a situation with an assassin with loyalties that aren't quite clear, a dissident with power, and one of the leader of The Concern with too much power. The result is a pretty suspenseful tale, with a link back to our world to keep the reader interested. Different from Banks's science fiction work, but not so different that I don't like it. Time for more Banks without M.. Four out of five stars.

Transition is closer to Banks' sf novels than is usual mainstream novels. It was published in the UK without the M, but in the US with it. His best mainstream novels is probably The Crow Road. Whit is fun, The Bridge is good, but a lot of the others are missable.

Good to know. What about The Wasp Factory?

That's a good one, thought it's gruesome in places.

Super gruesome.

Sounds intriguing. Like a little kid, this makes me just want to read it...

Book #80: Sprookjes van Tolkien by J. R. R. Tolkien (24-09-2012 / 25-09-2012)
With the movie 'The Hobbit' (Part 1) coming out this year I am in a Tolkien reading mood. I read 'The Hobbit' earlier this year, and when I found this collection of three Tolkien fairy tales, I didn't hesitate. Contained in this book are the stories 'Smith of Wootton Major', 'Farmer Giles of Ham' and 'Leaf by Niggle'.
The stories are real fairy tales. Like 'The Hobbit', they read as if they are ideal to read out loud. None were from the LotR universe (I believe), but they still evoked that feeling of a simpler time. They contain fairy lands, dragons, kings, and a vision of the after life, or a dystopian future.
All in all it was nice to have read these stories, even though they don't contain any hobbits or elves. Tolkien is just a great writer with a wonderful imagination. Four out of five stars.

Book #81: Het dagboek van Bridget Jones/Bridget Jones's Diary by Helen Fielding (25-09-2012 / 26-09-2012)
I usually get my books at a charity shop. They are second-hand, but very cheap, even though you have to search well to find something of quality (in Dutch store, one case is usually reserved for books by Konsalik...). One of the books that always turns up in many copies, is Bridget Jones' Diary by Helen Fielding. Even though I really liked the movie when it came out, I didn't want to shell out even €1,00 to read the book. But when I found it for free I couldn't resist.
From what I remember of the movie (it has been a good 11 years since I last saw it) it is pretty close to this book. It is the diary of Bridget Jones (of course), a thirty-something woman living in London. She's single, in love with her boss, and has to deal with friends and family and their relationship problems too. She obsesses over her weight and looks, age and future. And all of this is written in her diary.
It is a fun read, fluffy and entertaining, but not much more than that. However, sometimes I need to read books like that, so this was perfect. Four out of five stars.

Book #82: Rocannon/Rocannon's World by Ursula Le Guin (27-09-2012 / 28-09-2012)
Ever since reading Wizard of Earthsea I have loved Le Guin, and I have been slowly collecting (second-hand) copies of her work. Recently I found Rocannon (Rocannon's world), a book in the Hainish Cycle.
It is the story of Rocannon, an anthropologist on an alien planet. On the planet there are several humanoid species which are living in an iron/bronze age level of development. The story is divided into two parts, all involving Rocannon, but spanning many (planet) years. The first story is very traditional, about one of the upper-class species families who has lost all its wealth because of the aliens. The wife wants her wealth back, and starts an adventure to find a legendary necklace. The second story is about Rocannon, who discovers the planet is under attack and without access to technology tries to save it. This involves an epic quest to lands unknown to meet the oldest species on the planet and find the enemy base.
When I read the book I just enjoyed it for what it is. I love Le Guin's style and wasn't disappointed here. The mix of a high-technology alien species and a pretty basis planet is wonderful, and teaches both species new things. Afterwards I read the reviews on LibraryThing and the page about the book on Wikipedia. There they linked the story to literary history by mentioning that the upper class species resembles Norse Gods (blonde hair, warrior culture), and to heroic fantasy (a quest with species that resemble dwarves, elves and humans). I agree with that, but still the story is different enough from standard fantasy to be very enjoyable. Another fun fact I learned was that this book has the first mention of an "ansible" (faster than light communication), something which has been in use in science fiction by various writers ever since, not just by Le Guin. Four out of five stars.

Book #83: Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe (28-09-2012 / 04-10-2012)
Recently one of my colleagues and friends gave me a big pile of English classic fiction. Yay! I couldn't wait to start one, and the first one that grabbed my attention was 'Robinson Crusoe' by Daniel Defoe, the classic story of the castaway on a tropical island.
- Warning, this summary has plot-line spoilers, however, this is a 300 year old story, so I figured most people know it anyway -
That was actually all I knew about the story, that Crusoe was a castaway who lived on an island for a long time, with a man named Friday. The book itself cover a lot more. It starts when Crusoe leaves his (British) home (against the advice of everybody) to go to sea. He has a few adventures (including being held as a slave in Morocco for two years) and starts a plantation in Brazil. It is when he goes to get slaves for his plantation and those of associates (cutting out the slave traders) that he is involved in a shipwreck and arrives on his island. In my book we are nearing page 100 of 300 by now. He is the only survivor, and spends his time gathering supplies from the wreck of the ship he was on, building a safe place to live, and gathering food. After a while he has a nice life going, with a comfortable home (including self-made furniture), animals (cats and goats) and food growing nearby (barley, rice and grapes). He discovers that the island is frequented by cannibals, and one day frees one of their victims, who will become Friday, his servant. A couple of years later one of the Spanish sailors who have apparently stranded on the mainland in the cannibals' villages is also brought to the island to be eaten, and is also freed by Crusoe and Friday. Friday's father was also with them, and was also freed. Later on the Spaniard and Friday's father go back to the mainland to get help and see if Crusoe will be safe there. When they are gone, an English ship appears, apparently under mutiny. Crusoe and Friday free the original captain and help him and his crew take back the ship. Eventually the ship takes him back to Europe. He arrives back in England discovering almost his entire family is dead. He goes to Portugal to claim his Brazilian estate and travels back to England overland, having an adventure with wolves and bears in the Pyrenees. Eventually he decides he cannot go back to Brazil and sells his estate, marrying and having kids in England.
- End of spoilers -
The story has so much more than Crusoe on an island. Sometimes it is a bit too much (like the LotR movies, it seems to have several endings yet keeps going), but I can't really be annoyed by it, as it is such an old book (293 years!) and who knows what was normal in writing back then. The book itself is very readable. Defoe rambles on sometimes (long sentences of a paragraph), and some themes aren't very proper anymore (black man is a servant or slave automatically, is naturally dumber) but that is to be expected. I enjoyed it very much, and give it four out of five stars.

Book #84: Een handvol duisternis/A handful of darkness by Philip K. Dick (04-10-2012)
This is a collection of short stories by Philip K. Dick, ranging from horror to science fiction. In the Dutch collection I have (Bruna, 1968) some stories are missing when compared to the 1955 edition. I loved reading this collection, all stories were pretty good. I especially liked "Second Variety" about a war between the US and Russia that has destroyed the world and is now fought with robots (from the US side) that kill humans. As usual with short stories, I found them too short. These stories were good enough to be longer, to know more about the subjects and what happens next. I know that this is also the power of a good short story, but still. Anyway, a good solid collection of classic science fiction and horror, four out of five stars.

Whew, I am finally caught up again with the reviews :D

Book #85: Het eiland van Dr. Moreau/The Island of Doctor Moreau by H. G. Wells (04-10-2012 / 05-10-2012)
H. G. Wells is one of the classic writers of science fiction, even though it might not have been known as such back then. I love to read my classics, and after reading Robinson Crusoe earlier this week I was in the mood for more classics. And this book also is a story written by a castaway living on an island.
Only Edward Pendrick isn't alone. He is saved alone by a ship that is carrying Mr. Montgomery to a strange island, together with a menagerie of animals. After arriving on the island, the captain of the ship is so annoyed by the filth of the animals and the strange servant of Montgomery, he kicks everyone off, including Pendrick, who is forced to stay on the island to wait for the next ship, which might not come for a year. The owner of the island, Dr. Moreau, isn't happy with Pendrick's arrival, and Pendrick knows something very strange is happening. There are strange human-like creatures on the island who are 'wrong' somehow. He is not allowed to explore the buildings where they live, but hears the most horrible screams all day long. Slowly he discovers the horrible truth, and must fight for his life.
The story is pretty short (158 pages in my Bruna, 1997 edition), but very powerful. I love the writing style, I really can see the island in my mind. It is a pretty horrific story, but a very good read. Four out of five stars.

I have always mean to read The Island of Dr Moreau one day, your great review just nudged it up the TBR :)

Book #86: Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein (05-10-2012 / 15-10-2012)
I love to read Science Fiction, and have a collection of Science Fiction books. But this love originally came from my dad. He also read a lot of Science Fiction novels, and introduced me to Greg Bear (The Song of Earth and Power, because I was heavily into Fantasy back then) and Jack Vance. Now his books are in the attic, and now and then I go through them and take some (books, boxes, who's counting ;)). With this book it was funny, because I bought this book in Cologne, and a week or so later went through my dad's books, and found the same book there too. Ah well, at least it shows we are into the same novels, which I always like to find out. Anyway, I picked this one up because of its Hugo win.
This is the story of Valentine Michael Smith, a human raised among Martians who returns to earth with insights we are not used to. He tries to grok everything around him, a word that can be translated to mean 'understand', but understand in such a way he can also manipulate objects. For me, this novel falls apart into two sections, the one where Michael is held or claimed by the government, and the one where he is independent. The first part I didn't like at all, I hate bureaucrats and politicians, and it had way too much of that. What I did like were the descriptions of Michael's peculiarities and the glimpses we get of Martian life. The second part was ok, pretty religious/philosophic where Michael discovers the world and starts his church. This part was better, because we get to see more of his uniqueness, and we also get more of a back story.
Like other reviewers have said before me, in mentality, this book does show its age. It is very sexist (women in the kitchen and subservient) and homophobic (free love means men share women, not men love men). And the funny thing is, while I have complained in earlier reviews that older books were too short, this one felt too long. And I didn't even read the uncut version. All in all, nice to have read for the historic value of the work as a Hugo winner, but not one of my favorites by far. Three out of five stars.

It's been a while since I remember reading The Island of Doctor Moreau, but I always seem to enjoy Wells's work.

Late to the game, I know, but nice bookshelves!

Thanks allthesepieces!



Book #87: The Last Werewolf by Glen Duncan (15-10-2012 / 24-10-2012)
I heard about this book on the forums of LibraryThing, and was instantly intrigued. A story about the last werewolf in the world and the end of his life, because what is there to go on for after two hundred years and with nobody else left?
The world Duncan creates is the one we live in, we just don't know everything that is going on. Not only are there werewolves, but there is WOCOP, the agency charged with hunting them down (and partly responsible for their extinction). And there are vampires, who live in a kind of truce with WOCOP, and with intense hatred for the werewolves (hatred which is mutual). Jake Marlowe, the last werewolf doesn't have much to live for anymore, and just wants to give himself up to WOCOP to let them finish their task. But then things happen to change his mind and his worldview, and start a whole new adventure for him.
The book was good. Not great, but pretty good. I liked the world Duncan creates, and the mythology surrounding the supernatural beings. I got used to the literary style, although I could have done without it. I agree with other reviewers that the sex (and the style of writing about it) seemed a bit too much and too vulgar, and that the first 2/3 of the book were pretty slow (and annoying, I get it, you are the last, you are depressed). But for me, it was interesting enough to be hooked by it, so I give it four out of five stars, and will look for the sequel.

Catching up on some of the older threads tonight. Looks as if your "new" job (congratulations on a new job, btw!) is interfering with your LibraryThing time, sadly. (I'm in a similar situation with my old job being thoroughly revamped - in a good way - and it's hard to find spare time to hang out here now.)

I did like The Last Werewolf very much - lots of /too much sex, you're quite right, but I did have fun. I've got the sequel to read when I get the chance, too.

Yeah, the new job, and the fact that we are moving in about two weeks :D My evenings are filled with packing, DIY-ing, moving, travelling etc. No time really for any hobbies...
Thanks for the visit!

Sounds like you are definitely keeping busy! (I HATE moving! Hope it goes well for you.)

I am no fan of moving (I hate change) but this is one move for the better. From an apartment to a real house (an attic! a garden!) and from an extremely crappy neighbourhood to a pretty nice one. And closer (like an hour closer, one way) to work.
But it is a lot of work, both in the new house and the old, and we are both so tired... Only a week and a half until we move and until we have a week+ off from work...

Oh, sounds like a brilliant move! Congratulations on the house (and the attic and garden!) and the new neighbourhood AND the reduced commute! It'll be worth it in the long run.

Congrats on the new move & good luck with the DIY!

So, there was a booksale at work yesterday. With almost only science fiction and fantasy. Books were 25 cents a piece or 5 for one euro, and later on they were 2 euros for a meter. I walked away with this:



And two more bags.
I think I got 275 books in 20 bags for about 46 euros, which makes it a little under 17 cents a piece. How could I resist?

Yea, but now you have to CATALOG all of those, and list them for US!

Oh I will! As soon as we've moved house (tomorrow!) and are back online for real (on fiber!!!). I started offline today, in my own database listing just Author, Title and Original Title. Now I get to complete it all slowly (even that little amount of info took me nearly all day).

Wow, what a great deal! I am slightly saved from over-buying because the massive yearly library is pretty much inaccessible for wheelchairs (which isn't a good thing, of course, but it does mean I'm not surrounded by piles of books).

I tried to contain myself, but I couldn't... ;)

I went through them today, and as far as I can see, I only have 8 doubles. Some weren't catalogued yet, some I have in English and the Dutch title was nothing like the original, and some were contained in collections. Pretty good score if I do say so myself.

Lucky you! You did well!

LOL! By the metre! I think that's definitely the way to buy books. :)

Glitterfy.com - Christmas Glitter Graphics

I want to wish you a glorious celebration of that time of year when we all try to unite around a desire for Peace on Earth and Good Will Toward All. Merry Christmas, Sara!

Merry Christmas!

Here's to a great new year ahead, Sara!

Thanks for the best wishes everyone. We've moved, but there is still so much to do in our new house. I have started cataloging my book haul(s) in LT, so slowly you should see a lot of SF show up. Most titles are in Dutch, but for free or €0,17 I can't complain :D

Just catching up & a belated Happy New Year! Love the book haul :)