Avaland and Dukedom_Enough's Thread

Happy New Year! We are in our 12th year of LT and our 10th year of Club Read. Some years have been more active for us than others. Life just gets in the way sometimes.

There are TWO reading threads posted here - HERS and HIS. Feel free to follow one of us, or the other, or both!

Our introductions will be posted on the "Introduce Yourself" thread.

HERS (just a few on the TBR pile...er, piles)



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NOW READING



An Extraordinary Ordinary Woman: The Journal of Phebe Orvis, 1820-1830 by Susan M Ouellette (2017, nonfiction, setting/subject: Vermont)
The Language of Secrets by Ausma Zehanat Khan (2016, Crime novel)
She Would Be King by Wayétu Moore (2018, US - setting/subject: Liberia)

2018 BOOKS READ


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√ = reviewed.
Q2
Small Country: A Novel Gael Faye (2016, T 2018 from the French)
Dear Madam President: An Open Letter to the Women Who Will Run the World by Jennifer Palimieri (2018, memoir/nonfiction)
Poems: New and Selected by Ron Rash (2017, US)
Little Beast by Julie Demers (2015, T from the French 2018, Canada)
The Solace of Islands by Ansie Beard (2016, poetry)
Out of Bounds by Val McDermid (2016, UK)
The Bees by Carol Ann Duffy (2012, 2017 reprint with adorable cover!, UK)
Q1:
√Women and Power: A Manifesto by Mary Beard (2017, nonfiction)
√Those Turbulent Sons of Freedom: Ethan Allen's Green Mountain Boys and the American Revolution by Christopher S. Wren (2018, US, History)
√Rupture by Ragnar Jonasson (2017, Iceland, crime novel #4, UK edition)
√Instructions, Abject & Fuming by Julianna Baggott (2017, poetry)
√Warlight by Michael Ondaatje (2018, Canadian)
√West by Carys Davies (2018)
vThe House of Fame by Oliver Harris (2017, UK, crime novel)
√The Civil Wars of Julia Ward Howe by Elaine Showalter (2017, biography)
√White Houses by Amy Bloom (2018, US)
√The Mountain: Stories by Paul Yoon (2017, US)
√Such Stuff as Dreams: The Psychology of Fiction, Keith Oatley
√Waiting for Tomorrow by Nathacha Appanah (4/2018, T French)
√H(A)PPY by Nicola Barker (2017, UK, not presently out in the US)
√It's Even Worse Than You Think: What the Trump Administration is Doing to America by David Cay Johnson (2017, US)
√Deep Shelter by Oliver Harris (2014, UK, Crime Novel)

LAST OF 2017, REVIEWED BELOW

√ Wolf Lake by John Verdon (2016, crime novel, US)
√ Signal Loss by Garry Disher (2017, crime novel, Australian)
√ Ghachar Ghochar by Vivek Shanbhag (2013, T2017 from the Kannada)
√ Across the China Sea by Gaute Heivoll (2013, T2017 Norwegian)
What Happened by Hillary Rodham Clinton (2017, USA, audiobook)
√ To the Back of Beyond by Peter Stamm (T2017, Swiss/German)

His:



I spend way too much time reading stuff on the internet, most of which I won't bother people with here.

Books Read (reviews I owe):

(tbd)

Books Read and Reviewed

Empire Games by Charles Stross

The Memory Bank by Wallace West

Annihilation by Jeff VanderMeer

Authority by Jeff Vandermeer

Books in Progress:

Multiverse: Exploring Poul Anderson's Worlds Greg Bear, Gardner Dozois, eds.

Welcome! This is a two-for-one thread. Michael is going to get to his list soon!

Last year we actually both read one title — The Book of Joan by Lidia Yuknavitch ... and we both liked it.

I have no goals whatsoever this year. Zip.

I look forward to following Y'all again this year even if it's mostly silent.

>5 stretch: Good to have you with us.

Happy New Year! A year without reading goals, while not doable for me I'm afraid, sounds interesting.

>7 OscarWilde87: Happy New Year! I've never been a hardcore goal person, but I have pushed myself in various directions (translated lit, African lit, books on Gothic lit, early American women authors, all of Angela Carter, all of Joyce Carol Oates's novellas...etc.).

I suppose I prefer a more "organic" or serendipitous approach these days.

Empire Games: A Tale of the Merchant Princes Universe by Charles Stross

Charles Stross's great subject is nuclear holocaust. He doesn't always - or even usually - bring out the explosions explicitly. More often, it's Chthuloid creatures hungering to eat our minds, or robots cheerily carrying on after we're extinct. But the specter of holocaust brings a sense of awful, potential finality to his stories.

Here, we have the seventh novel in his "Merchant Princes" series. There exist numerous alternate timelines, some with histories close to ours, some much more distant. A crime family of people who call themselves the Clan have the hereditary ability to transport themselves, with often-illicit cargo, between timelines. Worldwalking smugglers can cross borders easily, by shifting to worlds where those borders do not exist. I had not been reading these books, but this episode is written to be an entry point for new readers, so I thought I'd try it. A brief summary at the beginning brings the reader up to date, as do introductions to characters from the earlier books.

Events in the first six books evidently focused on the Clan's medieval, home timeline (Timeline One), and a high-tech Timeline Two with a history very like our own - up through 2003, when a Clan worldwalker nuked the White House. The now-divergent high-tech timeline carried out a return strike, leaving the eastern part of North America in Timeline One dangerously radioactive.

In 2020, the remnant of the Clan have moved to Timeline Three, wherein politics center on a Cold War-style thermonuclear standoff between a nascent, English democracy in the Americas and a despotic, French empire ruling Eurasia. The Clan serve as spies against Timeline Two, frantically trying to bring Three's computer and biological technology up to the level of an extremely paranoid, panopticon-surveillance society in which the Department of Homeland Security gets whatever it wants.

The political leaders of Timeline Two, meanwhile, see such surveillance as only right, to guard against threats that can literally materialize nearly anywhere - and did destroy the White House, killing the president. Two has artificial means of crosstime transit, and a few residents descended from Clan members - but these people have only one copy of the recessive gene needed for worldwalking, and thus no native power to do so.

But biotech advances rapidly. Meet Rita Douglas, underemployed 25 year old, raised in an adoptive family. Rita has some very interesting genes that can now be activated. She is..."convinced" might be the word...to become DHS's first worldwalking, covert asset. Some of the airborne drones crossing into Three have failed to return, and atmospheric sampling probles detect recent use of nuclear weapons. Stross's extrapolation of spy tradecraft into a reality of multiple timelines is quite fascinating, as Rita carefully explores a railway switchyard that is the only location in Three known to the intelligence community of Two. Can the two nuclear-armed timelines manage peaceful contact? Will Mutual Assured Destruction be their best solution? Stakes are further heightened because the new American democracy in Three is approaching its first political succession, closely watched by the tyranny across the seas.

Stross raises a number of questions that future books will explore. What is the proper role of an intellgence community in a free society? Can a society be both free and safe against sudden, covert nuclear attack? What does immersion in spy tradecraft do to its practitioners? Why was Rita's adoptive family so perfect for fitting her to a future job as a spy? What is the meaning of the mysterious ruins in Timeline Four?

The book starts a number of threads that won't resolve until future books. But it's a good place to start if Stross's other big series, the Laundry stories, haven't been giving you enough tastes of his talent for morphing the nuclear threat we live with into science-fiction and fantasy modes.

Four Stars

I enjoyed your review of Empire Games. If ever I am in the mood for contemporary science fiction I will give this series a try. It sounds quite relevant.

Merchant Princes sounds like an excellent Sci-fiction series. I'll need to look into this more for sure.

I’ve starred your thread. Looking forward to following.

>10 baswood: Relevance is why I read it, to be sure.

>11 stretch: Almost anything by Stross is worth a look. I note here that his story "A Colder War" is available free online. His trademark amalgam of Lovecraftian horror, nuclear fear, and spy fiction in about 13,000 words:


Roger Jourgensen tilts back in his chair, reading.

He's a fair-haired man, in his mid-thirties: hair razor-cropped, skin pallid from too much time spent under artificial lights. Spectacles, short-sleeved white shirt and tie, photographic ID badge on a chain round his neck. He works in an air-conditioned office with no windows.

The file he is reading frightens him.

This combined thread always entertains. Wish you both a great year.

Lois - thanks for taking the cr lead this year. Looking forward to your thoughts in those five books waiting to be reviewed - especially the last one.

Ha, love twofa’s.

Her: I really like McDermid’s Tony Hill/Carol Jordan series Lois. I’m up to no5, rationing myself.

Him: I have China Mievile’s ‘October’ near the top of the tbr mountain too, Michael.

Thanks, Dan. You are a valuable cornerstone to the group every year.

>15 Caroline_McElwee: I have not read McDermid's Tony Hill books, originally I thought they might be a bit of torture porn; but I ended up watching the old series with Robson Green and yeah, it was a bit of torture porn...but I watched (and enjoyed) them all.

I have some catching up on my reviews, the next few will be the last reads of 2017



Signal Loss by Garry Disher (2017, Australian)

A couple of hitmen on a job encounter some bad luck and get caught in a bush fire. Not so far away, and somewhat later, a man is found shot dead in his home. A small-time drug dealer and his young daughter have disappeared from their home. Meanwhile very expensive and large farm equipment is being stolen all over the area. Hal Challis and his team take on what will unravel slowly to become a complex and dangerous case. Ellen, now the head of the sex crimes division, will likely end up involved.

This is the 7th installment of the Hal Challis and Ellen Destry series of crime novels. Disher is a busy writer with two ongoing series and much other writing, so, as readers, we often have to be patient for a new Hal Challis novel. Disher writes excellent police procedurals: well-developed, complex, and interesting. He does a fabulous job balancing the criminal investigation process and integrating focus on the various individual characters' personal lives. The Challis/Destry novels are some of my favorite police procedurals and sit in good company with those series featuring: Rebus, Banks, Winter, and Erlunder (to name just a few).

>15 Caroline_McElwee: It is a rather long book; not sure when I'll get to it, but let me know when you're about to start.

I’ll probably pick it up next month Michael.

>17 avaland:--I have #6 and #7 of the Hal Challis series to track down and read. I don't usually read a full series, so this shows how much I really enjoy the Hal Challis books. I like the ensemble cast of characters, how they've evolved over the series, and the fact that in each book there is more than one crime, large and small, that the group is looking into. I have another Garry Disher book on my Kindle--not sure whether it's a stand-alone or the start of another series.

Have you read any of Peter Temple's novels? He's another Australian crime writer I like.

>20 arubabookwoman: I agree with everything you have said about the Challis series. I have read one of Disher's standalone novels (name escaped me) and one from his Wyatt series, Port Villa Blues, which I liked but which follows the criminal, a thief, if I remember correctly. Not my thing.

I have read two Peter Temple crime novels. The Broken Shore which was excellent and Truth which I thought very good but had some criticism of it. Here's the last paragraph of my review:

Temple's vision of Melbourne is exceedingly bleak, with little, if anything, of redeeming value. There's a bit of a glimmer in Vallani's introspection, but not much. The dialog is wonderfully done, the prose more literary than most procedurals. Temple introduces us to a huge cast of characters, so many that I began to keep a list to keep them all straight (I should note here that there are no female characters of any real significance, a bit regressive, imo). I like how Temple has once again used nature to reflect what's going on in the story. This truly is a complex, thoroughly entertaining book, albeit bleak, bleak, bleak. And because of the latter, I think his previous book is the better of the two.

Australians on LT gave me both Disher and Temple as recommendations some years ago. There is another Australian series by Adrian Hyland published by Soho Press here in the states (but likely out of print). I got my copies used. It features a half aboriginal female detective by the name of Emily Tempest who returns to the rural area she grew up in. Decent mysteries and very culturally enlightening. The two I read were Gunshot Road and Moonlight Downs.

>21 avaland: I wish Hyland would would write more Emily Tempest books.

>22 ELiz_M: Me, too!

Wolf Lake by John Vernon (2016, US)

Four young men in different parts of the country have been found with their wrists slit, apparent suicides. Each, before they died, recounted having a terrible nightmare—the same terrible nightmare. Now, a noted Harvard researcher and hypnotherapist, living in an Adirondack resort named Wolf Lake Lodge, is being accused of hypnotizing the men to kill themselves. All are believed to have come to him for smoking cessation therapy in weeks prior to their deaths. The hypnotherapist refuses to lawyer-up so his concerned sister contacts David Gurney, former and notable NYC detective, to conduct his own investigation. Gurney and his wife were headed further north on holiday but decide to divert for a few days to the Wolf Lake Lodge.

Gurney is an extremely capable detective, with excellent mental faculties and ample connections and resources from his working days in NYC. The case deepens and complicates, and the suspense builds. And here I’m going to admit that I read very few American crime novels these days, mostly because of their propensity for a lot of gun-waving and too much dependance on thriller elements (fear and suspense). This novel does fall into the thriller category but I picked this up for its criminal premise, and the woodsy, frozen setting (somewhere between Lake Placid and Plattsburgh, New York); which almost serves as another character. There is something wonderfully Gothic about the Wolf Lake area; Vernon has included abandoned buildings, unusually frigid temperatures, haunting wolf calls, a fair bit of taxidermy, even an old guy with an axe wandering the lodge property. Vernon’s Wolf Lake had more than enough to entertain me—enough so I was willing to forgive him for the guns and the dead bodies in the thrillereske resolution-ending.

>17 avaland:

I got this one as soon as it got published in Australia - and still had not read it - things just keep pushing it back. I love the series - so I should really get around to it (and the new Thorne novel - it kinda fits in the list of detectives you posted so if you had not tried this one, Sleepyhead is the first one)

>24 avaland:

I have a few of Verdon's books around the house and I keep hearing good things about him. Thanks for the reminder!

Following you and lurking, if not often commenting. Have a wonderful reading year.

Geez, Day 1, one thread, and I'm already overloaded with recommendations. Must try Garry Disher this year. You love him and he's an Aussie. It's time.

>25 AnnieMod: Will check out that book....

>26 janeajones: Hi Jane!

>27 amandameale: Whooooweeeee! Look who is here! My buddy and one of the original Club Read-ers!!! Do you have a reading thread here, by chance, Amanda?

To the Back of Beyond by Peter Stamm (Swiss, T2017 German)

Thomas and Astrid, and their two young children, have returned to their lovely Swiss home from what seems to have been a wonderful vacation. The couple are enjoying a few quiet, twilight moments together with a glass of wine and quiet talk out in front of the house before Astrid heads inside to put the children to bed. Indeed, all seems peaceful and perfect. It is this lovely moment that Thomas puts down his wine, pauses for just a moment, and then walks away…with just what he has on him.

And it is at this moment that the reader gets pulled into this little novel to a degree one might not be pulled into most. Even now you are asking, where did he go? After we stop asking questions, we become judge and jury, before some of us–perhaps the women readers—may question the author’s choices in regards to the gender roles.

Perhaps the story will not affect you so, but I have not been so involved in a novel since Shriver’s We Need to Talk About Kevin. And does it matter at this point how the story ends?

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Apologies for not giving more of a synopsis but I'm trying to keep my reviews short. For me, this book was less about the actual story than my response/reaction to it. For this reason I think it would make a great book club book.

This is my third Peter Stamm novel.

>29 avaland: Well that review pulled me in. And its $8something on Kindle, so I purchased it.

>29 avaland: That sounds interesting... Had you read anything else by the author (my library seems to have a few other ones but not this one...)

PS: The touchstone does not point where it should :)

Well, Lois, now I want to know more.

>30 arubabookwoman: Maybe it was a real personal response/reaction. I'll be interested in your thoughts. It's short. I think the question used in the publisher's blurb was something like: Are you loved for who you really are?

>31 AnnieMod: Yes, I have read Stamm's Unformed Landscape and All the Days are Night (no touchstone, apparently...or maybe it's in German). The former was pre-LT, the latter 2013 and I didn't write a review so I don't remember very much about either except that I enjoyed them. (will fix touchstone! thanks)

>32 dchaikin: You are swimming in books, Dan :-)

>33 avaland:

Thanks! They have All Days are Night so I will try this one. He sounds like an author I should like.

>30 arubabookwoman:, >34 AnnieMod: I hope you both like it.

>29 avaland: Having read your intriguing comments, I went off to track down my own comments from 2016 on All Days Are Night, which I really enjoyed but couldn’t remember very clearly. It sounds like my reaction to it was quite similar to your reaction here (my post includes the sentence ‘I haven’t made it sound very exciting, but it’s not about the plot’). I had meant to read more Peter Stamm, so I shall look out for To the Back of Beyond.

>36 rachbxl: The overall plot of To the Back of Beyond seems implausible but it did what it needed to do, I suppose.

The Memory Bank by Wallace West

This novel first appeared in the July 1951 Startling Stories (says ISFDB), but I am reviewing its 1961 Avalon Books hardcover version. The public libraries I frequented as a kid stocked lots of these small, hardcover titles from Avalon, many of which have nostalgic associations for me.

So, long ago humans escaped a dying Earth and settled the planets around Alpha and Proxima Centauri. Their civilization is centered on the Memory Bank, wherein citizens periodically deposit their memories, keeping only those of the most recent 90 years. The deposited memories no longer reside in their heads, just in the Bank. The process extends their lives indefinitely; there are numerous 1000-year-old, youthful, second-generation Centaurans around. This serene, highly developed civilization is threatened, on the one hand by the sinister, telepathic, never-seen Siriuns (sic), who demand ruinous trade terms, and on the other hand by human barbarians, later arrivals from Earth, who raid the Centauran planets for...well, women, mostly. The Centaurans can't quite manage on either front.

You see where this is going, right? After much strife, the Centaurans, eventually led by young Merek, who is a mere 50-year-old at the book's beginning, end Bank deposits in order to stop forgetting useful experiences. They recover strategic memories from the Bank, ally with the barbarians and other more recent Earthly immigrants, and defeat the Siriuns.

The various spaceship duels, land battles, giant-ice monster hunts, barbarian swordfights, tedious Council meetings, political betrayals, Siriun telepathic brain-invasions and the like are told in the breezy, 1930s-American wiseguy voice so common in mid-20th Century SF, deemphasizing the impressive body count.

In between battles, Merek weighs emotional attractions to two women: the tall, raven-haired, agressive, barbarian warrior Iskra, who goes about her frozen homeworld wearing only a fur kilt, and Marian, the 1000-year old, blonde, coolly-intellectual, chiton-clad head of the Memory Bank. The one who finally wins his love is...OK, let's not always see the same hands, class. The sexism here may not be as bad as you'd expect - both women have agency - but it's still pretty bad. The one Centauran woman we meet who has been kidnapped to be a bride is plainly well-satisfied with her vigorous barbarian husband, so we're not to worry about that issue, evidently. Sexual references are veiled, since most science fiction at midcentury was intended for 13 year old boys. From the character descriptions, everyone is white, cis, and straight. Mention of a long-ago bayonet charge against the aboriginal inhabitants of one Centauran planet is tossed off as an aside at one point. I note that modern SF&F stories are much more commonly inclusive along racial and other dimensions.

I like to note examples of what Cordwainer Smith called the Great Pain of Space. Here, the Centaurans dislike using hyperspace travel because it hurts. As a spacecraft enters hyperspace, the corridors fill with green mist, and the crew suffer muscle spasms and hallucinations; some die during the trip.

No need to enumerate the various scientific inaccuracies; not that sort of story. It does occur to me that West's Memory Bank may have been meant as some sort of metaphor for economic relations. Deposited memories/wealth as a dead weight on society? ...Nah.

I'm giving this an extra half star for sentimental reasons, but unless you share those, or you're an SF&F scholar, I can't see why you'd read this book.

One and a Half Stars

I have never heard of Wallace West. Enjoyed your review. I try and ignore all the sexism and racism in 1950's science fiction, times have changed (thank goodness) and so it does not do to get too hung up about it when reading old science fiction.

>39 baswood: Well, I don't think I get hung up about it, but I do try to comment on what's wrong with these old stories, even as I find reason to enjoy them. In West's case, I like thinking of myself as the Last Wallace West Fan. :-)

Yup, also ignorant of Wallace West, and now I'll be sure to avoid him :) (I do like SF from that time period, though.)

Hello to both of you.
I've caught up with your thread and enjoyed reading your reviews, which in at least for the last one seem to be much better than the book itself. :)

>41 auntmarge64: As you know, there are much better books from the period.

>42 chlorine: Thank you!

Ghachar Ghochar by Vivek Shanbhag (2013, T2017, India)

A young man, sitting in his favorite coffee house, introduces the reader to his family. They are a joint family, he says, parents, uncle, sister and our young man and his wife, all living under the same roof; the well-off owners of a spice company, a firm called Sona Masala. We learn, through the narrator’s simple and vivid storytelling that they were not always rich. Not so long ago, they were living in a rented, three room house in Bangalore (infested with ants), all of them surviving on his father’s income, 11-hour days as a salesman for a “company dealing in tea leaves.” This short book of about 150 small pages is a kind of rags-to-riches fable. Our narrator, who spends too much of his time in the coffee shop (for he no longer actually has to work for his wealth) tells of their lives before and after, and how they have changed or been changed. Ghachar ghochar, the title, refers to a made up word that loosely translates to “hopelessly tangled.”

“It’s true what they say—it’s not we who control money, it’s the money that controls us. Where there’s only a little, it behaves meekly; when it grows, it becomes brash and has its way with us.”

Sounds interesting Lois.

Across the China Sea by Gaute Heivoll (2013, T2017 Norwegian)

A son returns in 1994 to clean out the family home after the death of his parents. The house itself, its surroundings, rooms and various objects are filled with memories for him. His mama and papa had met working in a psychiatric hospital in the Olso area, and their shared dream was to have a house of their own where they could care for those who could not care for themselves. In late 1944 they built a house and moved themselves and their two small children from Olso south to a more rural area, and contracted with the government in 1945 to house and care for several mentally unstable men and five siblings whose parents were declared unfit.

With warmth and love, and “gentle humor”, the son tells the story– mostly chronologically, but also as memory dictates—of this unusual and unconventional “family”. This is a wonderful book, a compassionate story that will leave the reader with a sense of being changed by it.

This was one of my favorite books of 2017. It’s the second book by Norwegian author Gaute Heivoll, after Before I Burn (2010, T. 2013); another excellent novel and a favorite book that year.

>45 Caroline_McElwee: I think you would like it, but I think you would like this book even better!

>44 avaland: & >46 avaland: both of these sounds good, Lois. Having that feeling lately that I need a book I feel changed by afterward.

46> Sounds like a lovely book. Since we're doing a Scandinavian cruise in the summer, I'm on the lookout for some good Scandinavian lit.

>47 dchaikin: I know what you mean.

>48 janeajones: I am so envious! It's not the river cruise that stops in Estonia and St. Petersburg, too, is it? We are hoping to get to Scandinavia in the next few years. Maybe a cruise is the way to do it. Is it one of those giant boats or something smaller?

The first 2018 book....



Deep Shelter Oliver Harris (D.C. Nick Belsey #2)

Bad boy detective Nick Belsey is in trouble again. On a lark, he takes a date down underneath London, into an abandoned deep shelter tunnel which previously he found while chasing a suspect. A bit tipsy or perhaps just playful, she runs off ahead of him in the dark only to be grabbed by an unknown person and they disappear in the maze of tunnels. Belsey eventually returns to the surface. Does he report the kidnapping? Well, sort of; he just leaves out the part where he’s involved. What begins as a somewhat routine disappearance/possible kidnapping becomes more complicated, mysterious and possibly sinister as Belsey works the case, often in his own renegade way which in this case, may have upset some very powerful people.

This is not my usual stuff, per se, but the well-written crime thriller presents an intriguing mystery and the subject of the deep shelter tunnels under London is fascinating. And the exploits and thinking processes of our unethical, anti-hero can be a bit addicting. While he does make appearances at the station to confer with colleagues or mine information from the computers, he is usually out on the road, all non-stop action and thriller.

I see there is a third book now….

49> Lois, it's the Viking Homelands Cruise. It's a big splurge for us -- not a huge ship like Carnival or Norwegian, but definitely bigger than the river cruises. It does go on the North Sea: https://www.vikingcruises.com/oceans/cruise-destinations/baltic/viking-homelands...

>46 avaland: I was having trouble settling on something to read after The Tobacconist, and when I read your comments I was intrigued (after all, who can resist a book that leaves the reader 'with a sense of being changed by it'?), so I downloaded a sample right away, and immediately bought the full e-book on reaching the end of the sample. It's just what I needed - a book I can't wait to get back to (I even hid at the station this morning to make sure I got my time for reading on the train - quite a few people I know get the train at the same station, and there are days when I just want to read, not chat!)

>51 janeajones: I think the "river cruise" I mentioned was also Viking.

>52 rachbxl: I hope you like it. I'll look forward to your review!

It’s Even Worse Than You Think: What the Trump Administration is Doing to America by David Cay Johnston (2018)

There are a lot of Trump-related books out there, and new ones come out each day. This one arrived this Tuesday and I’ve been waiting for it. David Cay Johnston is a Pulitzer prize-winning, veteran, investigative reporter, whose speciality is economics and finance. He is a knowledgable, plain-speaking author, as one might expect from a journalist, but he is also succinct. He divides his roughly 250 page book into eight parts, the first an overview with historical insights as to how Trump has changed the presidency. The last part being the summation and conclusion, a part I chose to read first, as it happens. Other parts (each with several short chapters) are jobs, taxes, global affairs, education and fossil fuels/climate and science denial. The seventh part is a collection of a few topics: law and order, veterans, race and guns, and immigration. One has to appreciate an author who can say what they need to say in just 250 pages (not counting the notes at the end).

I read about two-thirds of this book. It’s sobering. Quite a bit of it I’m already familiar with, but some content was new to me. If you are person who doesn’t follow a lot of news and political discussion, this would be a good book to catch you up on what regulations have been thrown out, what norms have been breached,…etc. Johnston doesn’t mince words when he discusses the damage that the current president and his administration is doing to America. Some of us have grandchildren who will still be cleaning up the mess 20 or 30 years from now. In the end, Johnston invokes Martin Luther King and the idea of a better society before he turns to the reader and asks us what kind of society—what kind future will we chose.

>54 avaland:

On one hand, I want to read this one - unlike some hacks, Johnston is good at what he does and does not go for the sensational. On the other hand I am not sure I want to read a book about Trump. Thanks for the review! I suspect that I will read it as soon as my library get it... but we will see.

>54 avaland: Sounds like a good read, but not one I could stomach. I can barely handle it in the mini doses from news articles and whatnot. :|

>54 avaland: ouch, bullet. Thanks Lois.

54> I'm reading Fire and Fury. It's Even Worse Than You Think sounds a bit less sensationalistic.

>55 AnnieMod: I know the feeling, I do.

>56 .Monkey.: Yep, I know, but better to know than not, me thinks.

>57 Caroline_McElwee: LOL.

>58 janeajones: After F&F it might seem blessedly dry. No personalities in here, per se, just deeds.

59> Lois -- Fire and Fury is ALL personalities.

I read David Cay Johnson's first book on Trump, The Making of Donald Trump, which was published in 2016, and which he said was written to alert people to what Trump was really like. Unfortunately, too many people ignored or were deaf to the warnings. I began my review of The Making of Donald Trump with the words, "He's even worse than you think." So I'm really interested in reading his new book. At least based on the first book, Trump is so awful there is no need to sensationalize anything--just the fact ma'am.

>61 arubabookwoman: We both read his first also. It was actually the hubby who got me hooked on him. He picked him up on the internet probably from op-Ed’s. This book does broaden Johnston a bit.

>54 avaland: I might have to pick this one up. I'm finding it hard to follow the news these days, but I really need to inform myself of things somehow.

>63 bragan: I think it would be good for that. And it really gets behind the day to day headlines.

Ursula K. Le Guin 1929-2018

Locus Magazine notice here, John Scalzi in the LA Times here.

I was reading Twitter last night when the news appeared; people wrote an amazing rush of tributes just within the first hour. Without Le Guin's career, we would not have today's flowering of stories by and for women, persons of color, and LGBTQ people.

Oh I wasn't aware she passed!
She was such an important author.
Thanks for the notice.

>66 chlorine: There's a thread over on Science Fiction Fans where we're collecting obituaries and remembrances.

Here are more Le Guin links. See the Science Fiction Fans thread for attributions to specific people for finding these.

Kathryn Cramer (Facebook link) "Her death is like having a mountain disappear"

Washington Post

New York Times. Like several accounts, notes that Le Guin gave up doctoral studies to start a family.

LA Times: John Scalzi talks about Always Coming Home as his introduction to Le Guin.

Mary Robinette Kowal

NPR with comments by Kowal.

Tor.com

Jo Walton at Tor.com.

Margaret Atwood in The Guardian

Paul Krugman on Twitter

The BBC

Some Le Guin quotes

John Clute writes a tribute in The Guardian

David Langford reprints a funny bit by Le Guin

Some more Le Guin quotes at Lithub

>68 dukedom_enough: A bunch of those links aren't right, either go just to author pages or to this thread or have the LT link in front...

>69 .Monkey.: Thanks, .Monkey, will let him know.

Hopefully it won't be much trouble to relocate them, as I'm sure they're worth a gander! :)

>69 .Monkey.: Sorry; should have checked links in the preview.

H(A)PPY by Nicola Barker (2017, UK, not out in the US that I know of)

Nicola Barker novels are not for the faint-of-heart. They are smart, clever, often funny, and really mess with the art of fiction in ways that I find wonderfully fun and creative. I’m going to tell you up front that I can’t possibly do this book any justice in this review. That said, I’m going to try:

Mira A, our narrator, lives in a utopian future where the Young have been saved (they are beyond God). They are innocent, living in the moment, free from the “manacles of the past.” All are at peace and “in balance.”. Mira A also seems to be integrated with “The Graph” and “The Sensor”, has ocular devices, and can be, or is chemically regulated. As Mira A begins to tell her story, she begins to glitch, or in more human terms, rebel.

I remember when I reviewed Barker’s Impact Dublin Award-winning book, Wide Open, I said something to the effect that ‘everything in the book is made to serve the story’ and in this book, the narrative is the story, the printed words of her narrative turn color, make patterns, repeat…etc. Bits of Paraguayan history, and that of one guitarist in particular, keeps inserting itself into the narrative. Says Mira:

Because Now all creatures are equal. That is our Philosophy. No one may be raised above. So The Sensor—because we want it to, because we need it to, because we ask it to—helpfully breaks these once-lauded individuals down into their component parts. It deconstructs them. They are accorded mere numbers. They are not credited with names, because names generate a kind of tiny, psychological implosion, a connection, a dangerous synergy that bounces between the letters and the information and the image and the meaning. This guitarist was Paraguayan and his number is 91.51.9.81.81.1.2. (pg 8/9. note: the underlined words are blue in the book).

One can’t help but laugh through this book, it’s a utopian satire after all, and Mira is a great character, but again, EVERYTHING in the book is made to serve the story. I really enjoyed it.

Photo of page 172; the narrative is relatively tame here, LOL.



Funny thing: I had no problem reading those wave lines, which are a horizontal mirror image....

Here's The Guardian's review

Enticing review. If only, there weren't so many books lying around......

That sounds interesting, and the page reminds me of House of Leaves (which I quite disliked due to the anticlimax ending, but the funky styling I found intriguing/amusing, lol).

>74 janeajones: Oh, yes, I know the problem of too many books (never mind that I'm in the bookstore 3 mornings a week).

>75 .Monkey.: Yes, I suspected it might have some similarities to House of Leaves, and there was mention in the Guardian review (I think) of some elements similar to the George Saunders book. I have not read either of those.

Waiting for Tomorrow by Nathacha Appanah (2015, T2018 French)

Waiting for Tomorrow tells the story of Adam and Anita, who meet at a party in Paris, both feeling out of place and hiding in the same corner. Adam, an artist and craftsperson, is from the Basque region on the SW French coast. Anita, an inspiring writer, is originally from Mauritius. They fall in love and move to the country, where both thrive and pursue their creative goals. After their daughter is born, they become more practical and move away from their artistic pursuits, and over time this begins to strain the marriage.

Enter Adéle, an illegal immigrant from Mauritius, who comes with her own story, and who they hire to help in the household. Adele seems to bring harmony and renewal with her, the marriage is renewed under her spell, but liberties are taken that leads to tragedy.

This beautiful and tragic story is written in a prose that has a kind of seductive rhythm and resonance to it, which heightens its emotional depth and melts the reader into it.

Night has fallen on the forest, the house breathes softly like a great animal in a deep sleep. Adam is washing dishes. On the table lie newspapers, mail, papers of various kinds, a doll, a teddy bear, a bunch of keys. Two felt pens without their caps. Faded peonies stand in brownish water that gives off a smell of sickly sweet decay, their petal scattered around the vase.

One might remember Appanah's previously translated book, The Last Brother, which was well-regarded here on LT, at least in the circles I travel. I gave it five stars, so I wondered if this new translated novel could hold up to that one. Comparing novels, even those by the same author, is often a futile exercise, so I will just say that this is also a short, beautifully translated book, a different story, and another very worthy read.

--------------------

The book is due out April 3rd here in the US, from Graywolf Press, who incidentally is the publishers of the two Gaute Heivoll novels I have loved.

Lovely quote.

>77 avaland: Waiting for Tomorrow sounds wonderful. Hope I can get my library to order a copy.

>79 auntmarge64: It's not a hardcover, but being released in paper so I wonder if libraries will pick it up.

>80 avaland: It was a long time ago I used libraries in the US so I don't recall very well how mine were, but the public library here, at least, has very many paperbacks, in addition to some rebound paperbacks-into-hardbacks and some "regular" hardbacks.

My library has a number of paperbacks, too. They get a tough plastic outer layer glued on and then they're sent out into the world.

I like Graywolf Press quite a bit and I'll keep an eye out for this one.

My library has a number of paperbacks, too. They get a tough plastic outer layer glued on and then they're sent out into the world.

I like Graywolf Press quite a bit and I'll keep an eye out for this one.

>73 avaland: Interesting.

>77 avaland: I read, and liked The Last Brother, adding this to the list.

>73 avaland: Very interesting review!
I like to read ebooks a lot, but this is clearly a case where the paper version wins hands down against the ebook version.

Very interesting review of waiting for tomorrow also.

>77 avaland: enjoyed your review. something to look out for in the French bookshops around here.

>81 .Monkey.: That's my problem, too, I just never go to a library these days.

>82 RidgewayGirl: Ah, there's the answer!

>84 Caroline_McElwee: And that is a very long list! (but it's a short book)

>85 chlorine: Thanks. It's a very interesting book for sure, for the adventurous reader.

>86 baswood: Thanks, Barry. I wonder if the French text reads like this English text does... It's been out for a few years over there.

>80 avaland: Some libraries do pick up pbs now, but whether Waiting for Tomorrow will rise to their level of consciousness awaits to be seen. There's always ILL.

Such Stuff as Dreams: The Psychology of Fiction by Keith Oatley (2011)

According to the author, the book is intended for “general readers, psychologists, literary theorists, and students,” of which I can only admit to being the first of the list, and perhaps also the last, albeit informally at this point. The book is roughly 200 fairly dense but not difficult pages in eight chapters, clearly a scholarly pursuit by the author, but also, I suspect, a labor of love—a love of fiction, that is.

Such Stuff as Dreams explores the psychology of fiction, how it works on our brains. Oatley discusses fiction in relationship to:
*Dream: modeling, world-building and simulation.
*Fiction an extension of childhood play (“fiction is the continuation of the creative play of childhood, not just for the authors but for readers”)
*Characters and action—“mental modeling of people and their doings.”
*Emotions: discussion of empathy and identification, re-lived emotions (from our own life experiences), exploration and projection (Fiction is “the joint creation of the writer and the reader”).
*The effects of fiction: “Can fiction have beneficial effects?” Understanding relationships, interaction with groups, and problems of selfhood. “Transportation” (being “lost” in a book), persuasion and enculturation. (Also mentioned is the related advertisement and propaganda).
*Writing fiction (I admit to skipping this section)
*Talking about fiction. Conversation and reading, book groups…etc.

Oatley writes well and plainly. He brings together scholarly research from around the world and references classics and quotes the words of notable authors when appropriate. There is much in this book to enjoy for those of us who enjoy both fiction itself and reading about fiction—which a kind of literary navel-gazing, don’t you think? There were so many interesting bits, just a few examples: when discussing the idea of reading as a form of self-improvement, “…But the idea that literature might instruct and enlighten has come under suspicion. Part of the devastation of World War II was the failure of the German citizens, one of the world’s most highly educated populations, to prevent their nation’s slide into Nazism.” This, of course, brings to mind current events. There is another brief discussion of the three kinds of stories that are universal: the love story, the heroic story, and the sacrificial story. There’s also the discussion of whether fiction has one meaning or many meanings, and how we make a fiction story our own (that latter bit is psychologically intriguing). And I like the idea that my reading fiction began as child’s play before I could read. Enjoyable and enlightening, this book both confirms some of what we already know as fiction readers, and also gives us plenty to mull over.

I really have a tough time reviewing non-fiction.

>89 avaland:
This seems quite interesting!

The bit about how fiction is the joint creation of the writer and the reader reminds me what Ken Liu said is in his introduction to his short-story collection The paper Menagerie.
He is a translator as well as a writer, and says in the intro that every act of communication is a miracle of translation, and wonders about whether the thoughts the readers have when they read what he's written are the same he had when he typed the words. He ends this part with this beautiful paragraph:

"And yet, whatever has been lost in translation in the long journey of my thougts through the maze of civilization to your mind, I think you do understand me, and you think you do understand me. Our minds managed to touch, if but briefly and imperfectly."

Ken Liu is one of two guests of honor at the literary SF/F convention, Readercon, this year (I think I mentioned it to you on another thread); it could be very interesting, considering your quote. I haven't been in a number of years because I read so little SF now (and mostly dystopias), but hubby goes for all three and half days.

>89 avaland: that book has the hat-trick, a book about writing, a teal cover and a Vermeer painting, I think it has my name on Lois!

>93 Caroline_McElwee: LOL! I'd called it a blue-gray with a hint of green, especially near the top of the book.

>89 avaland: Well, that's going directly onto my wishlist!

>92 avaland: Readercon sounds great! I hope "hubby"comes here to tell us about it once after he's attended. ;)

The Mountain: Stories by Paul Yoon (2017, US)

These six stories are about different individuals, set in different time periods and on different continents, and yet they read almost as a continuous narrative…almost. The characters are all people who have had trauma but find some moment, some measure of healing. The voice in which these stories are told, is both quiet and compassionate; it casts a spell on the reader and it makes the book very difficult to put down.

So often short story collections are uneven, a mix of the great, the good and the not-so-good, but this is such an even collection, all of the stories seemed equally good (which doesn’t mean you still can’t have favorites). I think the only other collection I have read which has been so similarly even is Alice Munro’s Open Secrets. This is a lovely read and would also be a nice gift for a reading friend.

>97 avaland: I’m making a note of this one, Lois.

White Houses by Amy Bloom

I picked up this novel because it had Eleanor Roosevelt in it and a blurb on the front cover from Joyce Carol Oates. I wasn’t at all sure that a sentimental love story was something I wanted to read (for surely it was likely to be “sentimental,’ right?). Once I began; however, there was no putting down it down.

This love story is between First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt and reporter Lorena Hickok, two of the most interesting characters who could show up in fiction. In an unforgettable voice, Lorena tells the story of her life growing up poor in South Dakota, how she met Eleanor and then moved into the White House with her, what life was like there, and how they separated. It’s a mesmerizing story of women, love, and the challenges they faced creating a bit of space for their relationship. The profile we get of Eleanor through Lorena is of the Eleanor we know and an Eleanor perhaps we didn’t; it’s compelling and affectionate. The book made me cry more than once.

I have finally caught up with my reviews. I don't want anyone to think that every book I read is fabulous, but it seems that way because I am at a stage in my life where, if a book isn't grabbing me in 20 or so pages, I move on to another (though sometimes I will go back to the abandoned ones later on). And I do tend to put off reviewing until there is a backlog and I have to do several.

Annihilation by Jeff VanderMeer

Part of the US coast has become "Area X": depopulated, cut off by a mysterious border, haunted by eerie presences. In this book, first of a trilogy, an organization called the Southern Reach sends in an expedition comprised of four women. They are identified only by the names of their specialties; the reader sees the story thorugh the viewpoint of the biologist. The biologist knows very little about Area X, and, as she and the others face shattering, uncanny experiences, comes to understand that much of what she's been told is false. Her experience of horror and mystery is the point of this short novel; numerous questions arise but answers will not be forthcoming, at least in this installment. Taking the journey along with her was a great reading experience.

Four stars

>101 dukedom_enough: I feel as I'm the only one who didn't really like Annihilation.
I'm glad you enjoyed it more than I did though, an I'm waiting for your impressions on the next books, which I will not read.

>102 chlorine: Am reading the second book now. Sorry you didn't like it.

>99 avaland: You definitely hit me with White Houses. It sounds terrific.

>99 avaland: >104 NanaCC: me too. Stop it. >89 avaland: came into land this morning. It will be a few weeks until I get to it though.

>104 NanaCC: I'll send it to you, Colleen!

>105 Caroline_McElwee: It took me 6 years to get to that psychology of fiction book, so a few weeks seems positively speedy.

>101 dukedom_enough: I will wait until you get to the end of the trilogy.

>106 avaland: Oh thank you. I’ll share it with Chris, as I know she’d love it too.

Edited to add, I’ve always found Eleanor Roosevelt such an interesting person. When I read No Ordinary Time by Doris Kearns Goodwin, her part in accepting the African American men as true soldiers instead of “cooks” was so interesting. Her thoughts were far ahead of her husband’s.

102> I was totally unimpressed with Annihilation as well.

>109 janeajones: Thanks for making me feel less lonely. ;)

I want to note here that on Friday morning we went to see the movie, "Black Panther." Neither of us are big superhero movie fans, though we have seen some.

We both loved Black Panther. The story was much more complex and the film more visually exciting than other superhero movies we've seen (the last we saw was Wonder Woman at my oldest daughter's insistence*). Although the world of Wakanda is imagined, and is a world that was never colonized, aspects of it brought to mind so much of the reading I have done of Africa. And the roles of women in the movie were strong ones, intriguing, despite that the superhero is male. We went because we heard on Joy Reid's show on MSNBC that it was great and we wanted to support the endeavor, but we really loved this cool movie (even though we are "older" and very occasional movie goes**).

Here is a really interesting conversation between an African and an African American about the movie.

*"Wonder Woman" is another discussion. But I will say that I won't ever be satisfied until there is a female superhero imagined and created by females, ok?

** The previous movies we saw in an actual theater were: "Selma," "Hidden Figures" (I saw that one twice), and Austen's "Love & Friendship."

>102 chlorine: >107 baswood: >109 janeajones: Am turtling along, will let everyone know.

>111 avaland: Thanks for your feedback on Black Panther.
I'm wondering if it would be relevant for my godson, who was adopted, is black, and was actually born in Central Africa, which if I understand correctly is the place where Wakanda is supposed to be. I'll talk about it with his dad...

Side note: I really appreciate that movies are going out at the same time worldwide now (or at least they go out here in France at the same time as in the US)! I remember when I was in my twenties, when a movie I really liked went out in the US the wait for it to become available in France was agonising!

>113 chlorine: Depending on his age, it probably would be appropriate. It's got the usual super hero violence, of course, and these days I don't know what age parents think is appropriate for something like that.

>114 avaland: His age is the main problem, I think, as he's only 8. But then his dad makes him watch movies that are inappropriate for his age IMO, but always at home when they can discuss what is going on and stop the movie if need be, which is very different from a movie theater...
Maybe the best is to wait till it goes out in DVD.

>115 chlorine: Perhaps, that would be best. We were there on a Friday morning (opening weekend), and schools were still in session. The small theater was full and I did see at least one father and son; the son looked to be 11 or so. This week is school vacation week so I suspect the theaters will be full of school kids.

>115 chlorine:, >116 avaland: My daughter looked at common sense media last week and reluctantly concluded that my grandson, who is eight, couldn't see it. They are recommending 12+.

https://www.commonsensemedia.org/movie-reviews/black-panther#

>117 NanaCC: Thanks for the link to common sense media!

He has seen Independence Day which is rated there 13 or higher, but again, not in a Theater. I'll advise waiting for the DVD then. :)

>118 chlorine: if you look at some of the parent reviews, they differ from the site’s review. However, I also know that some parents let their kids see movies that I’d not be happy letting my younger grandchildren see.

We saw it yesterday which was a school holiday, and the theatre was full of kids -- mostly middle school, but some much younger. I enjoyed the back story of the film, but was bored with all the action-fighting scenes.

>120 janeajones: I found some of them hard to follow. I guess they're required in a Marvel film.

And then there is the audience to consider.... We had an incident in our mostly white, semi-suburban town (one of the (thankfully) very few Republican areas in New Jersey) at a showing in which an inebriated woman started yelling the n-word and the theater had to be shut down. Even given our political climate I was surprised. I mean, normally people here at least try to be self-aware.

>122 auntmarge64: Wow. Trump's election has given many awful people permission to show who they are, it seems.

This morning we went to see Annihilation in the movie theater (twice in a movie theater in a month! We are lucky we go out that many times in a year!). For those who have not read the book, a quick, basic summary: A team of four women of varying specialties are sent in to an area of Florida now referred to as "Area X" to explore and determine what happened to earlier expeditions. The area has been closed off the the public for years as it seems something alien is happening within. The movie is not the book, two different mediums requiring different things (show vs tell...etc). I like to think I do pretty well to not expect one to be the other in most cases....

The first 2/3rds mostly follows the book...mostly, but the last third is a departure, hyped-up and overly sensational. It seems in the movies these days one cannot be merely held in continuous suspense, we must be scared witless. The movie featured five not four women, and plays up the husband-wife relationship. The downward stairs with the luminescent writing...etc is not in the movie. And they (as shown above) give Area X a shimmer to visually distinguish it (as seen above). That's all I'm going to say.

Michael grades it as a B; I give it a B-. Having both read the first book (he's read two thus far, I've read all three), we had lots to discuss during lunch afterwards. It probably is worth seeing just for that!

>124 avaland: Thanks for the review. Given how rarely I go to the movies I think I'll skip this one.

>125 chlorine: You are welcome! The next movie will be A Wrinkle in Time, I think.

Thanks for the comments on Annihilation. Now I have sorta mixed feelings about seeing it, although I'm sure I will when it's out on DVD. Isn't it odd, though, that they had to pick a specific location for the audience. (I always thought of southern California, but the books never say, I don't think. In fact, isn't it unclear whether the story event takes place on Earth?) And again, as I said on my own thread, why increase the number of people on the exploration party? I know, things have to be adjusted sometimes from a novel, but I never understand why basics change so much. When I see older movies, like "On the Beach", I love that the characters and much of the dialogue is straight out of the book. Eh, I know I'm just grumbling, but there it is.

Finally catching up on your intimidatingly long thread!

>24 avaland:, Wolf Lake sounds entertaining and sufficiently creepy, what with the dreams and all. I'm doing a lot of comfort reading lately, so I'll have to check this one out.

>29 avaland:, Fascinating! And the fact that it was as engrossing for you as We Need to Talk About Kevin is definitely an endorsement.

>89 avaland:, Such Stuff as Dreams sounds great. I really like books about books. Your thread is, as expected, proving dangerous for me.

>90 avaland:, I have the exact opposite problem. Non-fiction seems so straightforward to review. Was it interesting? Was it well-researched? Clear and accessible without being simplistic? Fiction gives me pains.

>101 dukedom_enough:, Glad you enjoyed Annihilation. I loved the lack of answers, which seems like the point. I'm worried about the film adaptation.

>102 chlorine:, I liked Annihilation more the more I reflected on it. I actually ended up reading it and the second volume twice, to refresh my memory in advance of reading the third book. It's the kind of thing that sticks with you, I think, which prompted me to bump up my rating after the fact.

>122 auntmarge64:, Wow. I can't even.

>124 avaland:, Lois, you're confirming my fears about the movie. While I too think that there are different demands for different formats, I think I'll skip this one.

>128 fannyprice: I have to say that, unfortunately, Annihilation did not stay with me so I did not think about it much after I finished it. But I can easily understand how it's a book that benefits from being thought upon and read again. :)

>127 auntmarge64: I thought that it was clear that Area X was in northern Florida?

>130 RidgewayGirl: Huh, I guess I missed it. Oh well..... Still loved the book, wherever it was!

>128 fannyprice: :)

>127 auntmarge64: I thought that it was northern Florida also.

i would urge you all to go see the movie so we can discuss it somewhere, although to be frank, those books were so, so many books ago that I had to have the hubby confirm whether I was remembering things correctly.

Authority by Jeff Vandermeer

This second book of Jeff Vandermeer's Southern Reach trilogy pulls back from the mysterious Area X, to examine the Southern Reach itself - the covert government agency tasked with understanding the phenomenon, located a few miles outside the border. After 30 years of sending in expeditions, the Reach has gotten nowhere. We follow the viewpoint of John, usually called "Control", who is due to become the new director; the previous director was the psychologist on the expedition in the first book, and did not return.

The newly arrived Control finds that the staff of the organization have low morale; some seem not quite sane, and hidden agendas abound. The assistant director resists the takeover. Control himself is a sort of hereditary covert-operations prince, shielded from the consequences of previous failures only because of the power wielded at very high levels by his mother. He needs to succeed here, success that seems ever more unlikely given the dysfunction he encounters.

The surveyor, the anthropologist, and the biolgist from the expedition recounted in Annihilation have returned. From that first book, we know that they must not be the actual women who went in, but doppelgangers of some sort. Control doesn't know this, and begins to debrief them. But the assistant director moves the surveyor and the anthropologist outside the Reach, inaccessible to him, her objectives evidently having overridden those of the organization. Control's interviews with the biologist - the first book's viewpoint character - proceed slowly. She claims to have little memory of Area X.

The book presents a fine examination of an institution that has gone crazy because it can neither carry out its mission nor stop trying. As much effort goes to political infighting as to the mystery they face. As in the first book, actual scenes of horror are metered out sparingly. When Control views video recordings from the first expedition into Area X, long before, what he sees is made all the more terrible by Vandermeer's withholding of detail, but we do learn about the screaming.

I think the best explanation for what Vandermeer is doing here is in one statement by a minor character:


"We keep saying 'it' - and by 'it' I mean whatever initiated these processes (...) - is like this thing or like that thing. But it isn't - it is only itself. Whatever it is. Because our minds process information almost solely through analogy and categorization, we are often defeated when presented with something that fits no category and lies outside the realm of our analogies."


The other book I think of here is Solaris by Stanislaw Lem, in which humans will never understand the mysterious planet they explore. The explorations into the Zone in Arkady and Boris Strugatsky's Roadside Picnic also come to mind. We humans can only understand a few things. Area X cannot be understood.

But it can be experienced - or suffered. The book's end is satisfyingly suspenseful as Control pursues the escaped biologist through a rugged landscape.

Four stars

>133 dukedom_enough: Thanks for a great review of Authority.
I probably won't read it so it's nice to know what it's about. :)

>133 dukedom_enough:. That series is getting better.

>134 chlorine: Well, it's not for everyone.
>135 baswood: Or my reviews are getting longer, at least.

>133 dukedom_enough:, Michael, "a fine examination of an institution that has gone crazy because it can neither carry out its mission nor stop trying" is a great description for both this book and so many of our government institutions at this point. I might have to steal this and put it up at the office. :)

>137 fannyprice: This does seem to be a universal problem institutions have.

The House of Fame by Oliver Harris (2016, UK)

Bad boy detective Nicky Belsey, under suspension for gross misconduct (pending a hearing) is quietly living under the radar in London in a local police station which was recently closed up due to cost-cutting measures. A phone call from a needy older woman pulls him out of his hovel and before the reader know it, one thing has led to another and Nick is working security for the very famous, young and pretty music star, Amber Knight. And, as to be expected in these novels, the bodies start showing up.

This is an unabashed crime thriller, intelligent and highly addictive. Nick Belsey always breaks rules, plays both sides, and this time he’s thought to be involved and this must pursue his own investigation out of sight of the police. And, my, what a twisted and tangled trail he follows leading to places the reader would never guess. I laughed a few times with the audacity of Nick Belsey and the storyline itself. It’s a fun ride right to the end.

This is the 3rd book in a series, but they can easily be read separately.

The Civil Wars of Julia Ward Howe by Elaine Showalter (2016, Biography, US)

First let me say that I admire the author Elaine Showalter very much. I read her book, A Literature of Their Own: British Women Novelists from Bronte to Lessing a long time ago, on my own, which is to say not assigned by any course, it had a real impact on the way I looked at literature, particularly that written by women. More recently I read her historical compendium, A Jury of Her Peers: American Women Writers from Anne Bradstreet to Annie Proulx. I’ve had my eye on this biography since it first appeared both because of its subject matter and because of who the author is.

----------

In the early 19th century, Julia Ward was a New York heiress, an intelligent, ambitious and talented young woman, who was also an aspiring poet, accomplished musician and singer. She was admired by many, and in New York society was often dubbed, “the Diva.” These days we are apt to associate her with her with one of her creations, “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.” Julia will eventually meet and marry Samuel Howe, a handsome, well-educated, highly respected humanitarian and war hero (he returned from the Greek war with Byron’s helmet) who was twenty years her senior. Howe is known for his work with the blind at the Perkins Institute in Boston. Until the time when Ward meets Julia, he had been too busy and bit too prudish to think much about marriage. They were two exceptional people who married….

What happens to the ambition of a talented and intelligent woman in 19th century America when she is expected to leave her aspirations and studies behind and embrace and find fulfillment in her new life of domesticity? In this wonderfully readable and sympathetic biography, Showalter draws on scholarly research and other resources to brings to life, not only the person of Julia Ward Howe, but that of the people around her and the fascinating 19th century world in which she lived. Julia is an unforgettable character in these pages and her struggles, both private and public, are heroic and pioneering. She is someone the reader will not forget quickly.

West by Carys Davies (2018, due out in April)

I admit to not having high expectations for this short novel despite the blurbs, the premise seemed rather simple or folksy or something, but nonetheless something made me bring it home with me.

West tells the story of John Cyrus Bellman, a widowed, mule-breeder in Pennsylvania, who becomes enamored or obsessed with a newspaper article about huge, ancient animal bones found in Kentucky and decides he must go west, alone, to find the creatures which belong to these colossal bones. He packs up and rides off west, fancying himself a kind of noble explorer. But this short book also tells the story of the 11 year old daughter he leaves behind with his rather stern, unmarried sister. As Bellman explores and travels the next few years, overcoming harsh winter and other threats and obstacles, his lonely daughter draws back from her aunt and tries to follow her father’s route using library sources. She faces threats of her own.

Despite my pre-judgement, it took less than than a few pages before I was completely engrossed in this story and the spare 150 pages flew by. In a blurb, Tóibin claims the story has “all the immediacy of a folk tale or a legend” and I would agree. It feels like a classic tale, a bit of history, but there is something much deeper there I can’t quite put my finger on…

>140 avaland: >141 avaland: added to the list Lois. I do have a couple of Showalter's books, including A Jury of her Peers.

>140 avaland:, Elaine Showalter is one of my favorites! I don't know a single thing about Julia Ward Howe, but Showalter is one of those rare authors of non-fiction where I'd read almost anything she writes.

>141 avaland: sounds wonderful! On my wishlist it goes!

>142 Caroline_McElwee: I have always meant to read more of her books, but....you know, so many books....

>143 fannyprice: Sure you know something about Julia Ward Howe...I bet you can sing the "Battle Hymn of the Republic"...Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming...join in anytime:-) I thought I knew a fair bit about notable 19th century American women writers, but I overlooked Julia Ward Howe somehow. The 1917 Pulitzer Prize went to a biography of Howe that was a collaboration between her daughter. http://www.pulitzer.org/winners/laura-e-richards-and-maude-howe-elliott-assisted...

>144 Tess_W: It's coming out in April. A very quick read. Maybe you can tell me what that thing is I can't put my finger on....

Both The Civil Wars of Julia Ward Howe and West sound fascinating.

I agree with Jane The Civil Wars of Julia Ward Howe and West are definitely on my wishlist/radar now.

>146 janeajones:, 147 The Julia Ward Howe book is now out in paperback. West comes out in hardcover in April.

Also, Snowblind, the first book in an Icelandic crime series (rookie cop in a isolated fishing town in the north) has finally come out in the US. It's in paperback. I just received book 4 in the series from the Book Depository. I recommend the series if you like other Icelandic authors.

>139 avaland: 'This is an unabashed crime thriller, intelligent and highly addictive.' I think, then, that this (or maybe the first in the series) might be just what I need right now. I can't seem to settle on any one book, and I want to be immersed in something.

>141 avaland: I am intrigued!

ETA that I have also (in addition to the Harris, I mean) just downloaded a sample of Snowblind. That was quite a profitable little visit to your thread ;-)

>149 rachbxl: When I read the first one, I was appalled. And yet, I kept reading....

Oh, and don't forget the earlier books, the Paul Yoon collection and the forthcoming Natacha Appanah....you would enjoy both, I think (both fairly short books)

Our reading and reviewing has slowed considerably because of ....

This...

(lots left to do...countertop, backsplash, floor...)

And this...

Overnight during the last storm.

And this...

work, work, work... (I kept the photo small so you wouldn't be distracted trying to read the titles)

And did I mention this...

(luckily in March the snow melts down between Nor'easters)

Your grandson is gorgeous! The quilt is beautiful, too. I look forward to pictures of the finished kitchen.

>152 RidgewayGirl: Thanks. Very adorable; we try to keep up with him. It will be a few more weeks for a finished kitchen picture. I haven't even really thought about the backsplash yet!

I'm excited to see that IMDB has a page for the miniseries adaptation of China Mieville's The City and the City. Hard to see how the consciousness of Mieville's characters can really be captured on screen, but I'm looking forward to seeing how they try. Out in 2018.

>154 dukedom_enough: I saw the trailer for that recently Michael, it didn't give much away (not even the broadcast date), but I'm looking forward to it.

>155 Caroline_McElwee: Is there a URL? Can't find it.

>154 dukedom_enough: I really wonder how they would render this book on screen as well!

>156 dukedom_enough: the trailer was on tv Michael, can't find an online one. Here's a piece about it. Airing in the UK from 13 April.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/latestnews/2017/david-morrissey-the-city-and-th...

>158 Caroline_McElwee: Thank you; interesting. I'm happy to see Mieville was involved.

>157 chlorine: There may be a clue in an image from the IMDB page (IMDB evidently doesn't allow linking). Two people seated on a backless, outdoor bench, facing in opposite directions, each using a cell phone. The man is facing a mainly blue street scene, the woman a mainly yellow one. So, color-coding the cities? But how would they show cross-hatched areas? These two are Inspector Borlu and Constable Corwi of the respective cities; I bet they're talking to each other over an international connection.

>160 dukedom_enough: "But how would they show cross-hatched areas?"

Green?

>161 ELiz_M: Maybe?

>158 Caroline_McElwee: If you get a whiff of when this will air, i would appreciate a nudge:-) I think my British son-in-law has a tricky way to see it when it's airing on that side of the pond.

>163 avaland: the info I have is 13 April Lois. If that changes I'll let you know.

Multiverse: Exploring Poul Anderson's Worlds, edited by Greg Bear and Gardner Dozois

As Poul Anderson is a favorite of mine, I read this festschrift wherein Anderson's friends and admirers wrote stories set in some of his imagined worlds. This sort of book is a lovely way to honor a departed writer. Anderson died in 2001, the anthology is from 2009.

Most of the stories are sequels happening after the action of Anderson's stories. It's immediately clear that many people's favorites overlap. Of the 13 fictional pieces here, there are three Time Patrol stories, and two each following Three Hearts and Three Lions, "The Queen of Air and Darkness", and the Dominic Flandry stories. This leaves dozens of his worlds completely untouched.

The best is by Nancy Kress. In Anderson's "The Queen of Air and Darkness", human settlers on the planet Roland were haunted by Faerie, or so it seemed, some of their children kidnapped to become changelings. The glorious elves and spirits were revealed to be but telepathic illusions, cast by hidden, indigenous inhabitants, designed to appeal to basic mental archetypes. Kress's sequel, "Outmoded Things", looks at the difficulties attendant on integrating into mundane, human society the children who had been raised as woodland sprites, the companions and worshippers of magical beings. Educating adolescents out of the lovely dream in which they thought they lived is as fraught as any recovery for abused persons. So tempting for some to return to the dream - not just the children, but the aging psychologist who is treating them. Kress is perfect at portraying their dilemmas.

I wouldn't have expected Stephen Baxter to produce a moving story about wishing to escape into a better past, but he does so in "The Lingering Joy", a sequel to "The Long Remembering". In Anderson's story, a modern man's consciousness was cast back into human racial memory, and he experienced the era when Neanderthals were being displaced by homo sapiens. After returning, he found his actual life disappointing. Baxter's story features the estranged daughter of Anderson's protagonist, seeking the past for her own reasons, while extinction looms for modern humans.

David Brin's "Latecomers" concerns the excavation of the wrecks of ancient, sentient starships in the asteroid belt. The story is not set in any of Anderson's worlds, but in one which Anderson, as a mentor, helped Brin think through. That this is one of the better stories suggests a flaw in this sort of project, that writers do better following their own muses, not someone else's.

Most of the remaining stories disappoint along this line. Again following "The Queen of Air and Darkness", Terry Brooks's story jarringly inverts Anderson's theme. Raymond E. Feist turns in an Operation Chaos sequel that deals in a leering sexism that Anderson himself mostly outgrew.

The book also has nonfiction memorial pieces by Anderson's wife Karen Anderson, daughter Astrid Anderson Bear, editor and son-in-law Greg Bear, and friend Jerry Pournelle.

The book is really only for Anderson completists. If you're new to him, I suggest you find a copy of Hugo and Nebula Awards-winning "The Queen of Air and Darkness".

Two and a half stars

Tonight's trailer said starts 6 April.

>160 dukedom_enough: The picture in IMDB is interesting!

>165 dukedom_enough: Too bad the Anderson book was disappointing. The concept seemed appealing.

>166 Caroline_McElwee: So you, at least, will soon know.

>167 chlorine: Am glad I didn't buy the hardcover.

So much to explore here! West sounds particularly interesting to me. The two of you have such a wonderful thread going here.

>170 OscarWilde87: That's very sweet of you to say!

>111 avaland: Thanks for the link to the conversation about Black Panther - very interesting.

>170 OscarWilde87: Thank you!

Warlight by Michael Ondaatje (2018)

Set in the post WWII period, Warlight tells the story of two young teenagers, who are mysteriously left—abandoned—by their parents and left in the care of a somewhat dubious character they dub “the Moth.” Nathaniel and Rachel attend school by day, but at night the house is often filled with the eclectic friends of their caretaker. Then, their mother mysteriously returns—without their father.

The story is told with great compassion by the adult Nathaniel who tells of their survival during those early years: their growing up, the confused emotions, the adventures. But, he takes the story beyond this period and shares his understanding of what happened next, what was really was going on, what their mother was doing, and what has happened to them all since.

This is a beautifully written and beautifully told story—part coming of age, part mystery, part post-war tale—which casts a spell over the reader from the very first page and certainly lingers in one’s mind for a long time after it is finished.

-----------------------

For different reasons, this book brought to mind Helen Dunmore's Exposure and Gaute Hellvoll's Across the China Sea, the former for the era & subject matter, the latter for the way it was told and the compassionate tone of the telling.

Rupture by Ragnar Jonasson (2017, T Icelandic, UK edition)

This is the 4th installment of Jonasson’s Icelandic crime series, set in a small fishing community in northwest Iceland and featuring the police detective, Ari Thor Arason. Well, perhaps Ari Thor doesn’t have the detective title so familiar in other crime novels, but he's one of a few officers whose responsibilities encompass the whole range of police work. Serving in the “sidekick” position, at least for the story’s purposes, is Isrun, a veteran Reykjavik news reporter. A lot is going on in this short novel: the community is under quarantine because of a highly infectious disease, a man thinks someone is repeatedly lurking outside, perhaps, even has been inside his house, another man is killed in a hit and run accident, and a mysterious photo has surfaced related to an old suicide or accidental death case.

One of the reasons I enjoy these books is the small community setting in the north where people tend to know each other and the landscape is another character in the story. And no where in the book is that better illustrated than in the storyline about the mysterious 1950s death of a woman in a remote, nearly uninhabited region, where just two couples lived. The woman mistakenly put rat poison in her coffee: suicide, accidental death or something more sinister?. The other storylines resolve themselves over the book, but this particular one haunts and intrigues (so much so that I wonder if the rest of the book wasn’t written around it).

*And there are maps and guides to pronunciation in this edition! Woot!
*However, the 10 and half pages of blurbs for the series at the beginning of the book is annoying.
*Fascinating photo on the cover. Does it not look like icicles hanging? Actually, it's an image of an isolated house on the coast, with the water inlets reaching into the dark shoreline.

Those Turbulent Sons of Freedom: Ethan Allen’s Green Mountain Boys and the American Revolution by Christopher S. Wren (May 2018, US, 18th century history)

Well, I certainly had no idea what a pain-in-the-%ss Vermont was in its pre-statehood. I also did not know about the territory’s nasty feud with New York. And that’s just the beginning. The citizens of the territory had quite a role to play in the American revolution, too. At the center of all of this is the legendary Ethan Allen, his cousins, and others, who were early settlers in the territory then called the New Hampshire Grants, and made up the patriotic “Green Mountain Boys.” Christopher S Wren tells a riveting and honest story of these men and the battles they fought, with particular attention to Ethan Allen, stripping away the glitter of legend, for a more realistic portrait of the man (which is certainly no less interesting). There is much crammed into this extensively researched book’s 250 pages and sometimes the detail overwhelms a bit, but Wren keeps it easily readable, and succeeds splendidly in bringing a part of 18th century America vividly to life in this book.

You’ve added a couple of books to my wishlist, Lois. The Sons of Freedom in particular seems very interesting.

>177 NanaCC: It will likely be at your local library come May! I read it in just a few sittings.

>174 avaland: this will definitely be acquired as soon as it is out here. I love Ondaatje's writing Lois.

>179 Caroline_McElwee: Beautiful prose. Great story. You will enjoy it!

Good to know that the latest Michael Ondaatje is a good one.

Women and Power: A Manifesto by Mary Beard (2017, nonfiction)

Mary Beard is a professor of Classics at Cambridge and the author of SPQR, the popular, critically-acclaimed and highly readable history of ancient Rome. So, what might she bring to the discussion of women and power, you might ask?

This small, powerful book contains two essays, rewrites from two lectures Beard gave. "The Public Voice of Women" discusses the ancient cultural underpinnings of how we see women & public speaking. She references classical literature, Shakespeare, even a bit of Henry James. And she begins with the first recorded example of a man telling a woman to "shut up."

The second essay/lecture "Women in Power" takes a look at women at just that, referencing everything from Herland by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, and the ancient Greek idioms still used to represent "the idea of women in, and out of, power." She discusses Margaret Thatcher handbag and Teresa May's "shoe thing" and how those things work to defy being packaged into a male template of power.

Beard suggests that rather than the fitting into the status quo that "...if women are not perceived to be fully within the structures of power, surely it is power that we need to redefine rather than women?" Chew on that.

This book was a holiday gift from the hubby, an excellent choice. I've read a fair number of feminist manifestos of one kind or another, and I found this small entry into the canon—Beard's perspective—to be powerful and enlightening, and an excellent read.

Damn, you two need to stop reviewing such interesting books!!!

>183 auntmarge64: We aim to please, LOL (We know you secretly love it)

Instructions, Abject & Fuming: Poems by Julianna Baggott (2017, US)

Juliana Baggott has written fiction books for adults and teens; and as N.E. Bode or herself for children. I've read 8 of her books, including the SF YA trilogy that begins with Pure. I have three previous collections of her poetry, and now this, the latest. Clearly, I have loved her poetry (yes, you can call me a fan).

The poetry in this latest volume of poetry is wonderfully weird, sometimes funny, and always wise. She's let it all out in this collection, even just the titles are a delight:

"Claustrophobia: The Closet's Perspective"
"To My Lover, About His Bouffage Eating of Meats"
"To My Lover, His Hair Thick With Bear Grease"
"Today—Bored, Puckered and Lonesome—I Would Like to Order a Russian Internet Bride: A Trisonetto"
"Lice: A Mother-Daughter Love Poem"
and my favorite: "After Having Sex on Palm Sunday, Some Clarity."

I will skip the usual review beyond what I have already said and include one of my favorite poems from the collection (not sure if the format will hold up in the post)

"For the Blind Botanist's Wife"

We let the backyard go to field,
saw mice
swimming through it
and so we cut it back.

The mice came inside
to die in the walls.
The scent pooled in our bedroom,
lingered so
midair, overhead, bled
throughout the house.

I imagined John Gough, able to point

past the picture hung
to hide your fist-print
the shocked wall
pocked, headboard-worn

He would know the scent
Here she is. Curled dead,
pregnant, womb-spun
a week and two days gone.

What was it like to be Mrs John Gough—
to be a woman known
by scent, to be

known like furred bees,
knots of weedy stems, discerned
by the give of your skin,
its fevered burn?

>182 avaland: I enjoyed that book too Lois. I do enjoy her work. Have you seen her history programmes, usually on the BBC?

>186 Caroline_McElwee: I saw that it was in your library when I posted my review on the book's page and was meaning to ask you if you read it. I have not seen her history programs.

Lovely review of the Ondaatje novel. I'll keep an eye out for it.

>188 janeajones: It's probably better than my review. I think you'll like it, Jane.

I saw that someone else had done 1st quarter stats and I thought, 'hmm, I haven't done that in ages..." So, for fun:

15 books read: 5 nonfiction;1 poetry; 9 fiction (3 of which were crime novels).

Male authors 8; female authors 7. New authors to me: 5

Settings of the 6 novels/collections that were not crime novels: the future 1; the present 1; the past 4

Gender of main character/s in the 6 novels: male 1, female 2, shared M/F 3

Publication date: 2018 (5); 2017 (8); 2014 (1); 2011 (1)

Author nationality or country of origin: US 7; UK 5; Canada 1; Iceland 1; Mauritius/France 1

Note: although I seem to be reading more US authors than I have over the last few years (and being back at the bookstore may have something to do with that), it can be noted that of my 5 "best of" fiction books of quarter one—as listed on the appropriate thread—only 1 is a US author.

Well, that was kind of fun. Will I make any changes, no.

Tracking the gender of the main characters is something I hadn't thought of. Hmmm.

>191 RidgewayGirl: I thought it might be interesting. Notice I did not include the 3 crime novels in that stat as they would skew heavily towards the male (at least the ones I tend to read).

But, noting the psychology of fiction as mentioned in #89 above, perhaps it's something to consider, however briefly.