Books read, 2014
Dec. 31st, 2014 05:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
peppermintesseBooks, 2014
Time for the yearly list of books read...January (4)
MaddAddam by Margaret Atwood: Actually begun in December. The conclusion to the Oryx and Crake and The Year of the Flood story. It lacks the shock and impact of Oryx and Crake, instead delving into Zeb's background, continued life post-Waterless Flood, and the future of the remaining protagonists as well as the Crakers. Many of the chapters are told by Toby as spoken to the Crakers, which is quite entertaining. A good read and a good conclusion to the trilogy. Still makes me chuckle when they mention the bio-engineered glowing bunnies; I really have to wonder if the appearance of same in Sherlock's "The Hounds of Baskerville" is an homage to these books.
The Case of the Green Carnation / The Fan Who Molded Himself by David Gerrold: Short stories, both involving Holmes in some way. The first is an interesting Holmes-meets-Oscar Wilde case, which made me wonder if the circumstances described are true. The second story is interesting, almost sci-fi-ish, though I'm sure I'm missing something re: the meaning of the title. Well worth the $3 Kindle price.
Ripped by Shelly Dixon Carr: I stopped reading this book after about a third of the way through. I think it was written for young adults, which isn't usually a bad thing (hello, Harry Potter and Katniss Everdeen), but it just wasn't very engaging. It centers around a girl whose parents have died in a car wreck (of course) and who, after visiting an exhibit about Jack the Ripper, learns that her ancestral family member was a (fictional) victim of said killer. She then has an opportunity to travel back in time and decides to… save the ancestral family member. (And not her parents, whom she actually knew, which is nonsensical.)
While there are some good turns of phrase, everything was so predictable (or had potential to be) that it became boring. I found my eyes skimming ahead not because I was excited to see what was coming next, but desperate to see whether it was going to get more interesting. When you make up additional victims then drive the plot with time travel to save victims who never existed, it's pretty obvious the protagonist is going to succeed. Introduce two male characters, and one's the protagonist's cousin, it's obvious who the love interest will be. And as for the love interest (one in the present, one in the past, basically the same guy, with the same name and everything), he's Cockney, which means his dialogue is peppered with rhyming slang. Now, I'm sure there's a certain charm to listening to someone speak the slang. Reading it was irritating. I'm not convinced it was even accurate; I doubt people in 1888 used 'rum and coke' meaning 'rum and coal product'. I honestly should have stopped right there.
I may skip ahead to the end to see if I was right on all of my conclusions.
[Pause—Spoilers ho!]
Okay. I did skip ahead to about 90% (Kindle book), and that's just about where Jack the Ripper is unmasked. Then I read to the end. Things do get a little bit more interesting at that point, what with time-travel moral dilemmas, etc., but it's still more than half the book that I didn't need to read, and there's still more ridiculousness about the modern world to which she returns: i.e. if she stopped Jack the Ripper before killing her ancestor, would they really not be doing an exhibit about him for stopping with the actual last victim? I mean, it's dramatic and all to see when she returns to find a different exhibit, but they do just such exhibits now, and at the end of this very same book. Hm.
Night Film: A Novel by Marisha Pessl: A dark, creepy, yet intriguing book about a fictional film director and the death of his troubled daughter, with an ending that may not be entirely satisfying, but is entirely perfect for this book. The descriptions are gorgeous, the characters well-fleshed, and the plot very surprising. In many ways, the odd plot, the inclusion of photos and website screenshots (lending an interactive aspect—the book has an app, as well, to access additional images and audio by scanning the special bird image), and the surreal qualities of this book makes it a spiritual sibling of House of Leaves.
February (3)
Billy and Me by Giovanna Fletcher: Not high literature by any means, but after the previous book I wanted something a little lighter. Many plot points along the way were predictable, but the overall book was a decent read and very relatable with an unexpected emotional punch. I never expected to care about Sophie or her life as much as I did when it came down to said emotional punch. Probably due to it hitting quite close to home.
Solo by William Boyd: I read most (if not all) of the Fleming books while in high school; this is newest offering in the Bond franchise. This one takes place in 1969; Boyd places Bond's birth in 1924, basing this on the biography in the 'obituary' in You Only Live Twice, which makes Bond 45 in this book. Having the story take place in 1969 allows the author in some regards to allow Bond to be (shall we say) more freely appreciative of the ladies, but the two main women in the book are not exactly shrinking pre-feminist flowers. The lack of modern technology also facilitated the plot.
(Funnily, I started out imagining Daniel Craig as Bond, then that mental image morphed into Roger Moore. Weird.)
The story itself is pretty standard Bond fare; I saw a few plot twists coming a mile away as per the Bond formula, but there were also moments of genuine surprise and moral concern on Bond's part. I must say my greatest surprise was, after Bond orders himself dinner at a restaurant, the footnote leading to… a recipe for the salad dressing that Bond whips up for himself. Progress, I guess?
Dark Places by Gillian Flynn: There really isn't anything about this book I didn't like. The storytelling is masterful, the plot gripping (and not at all run-of-the-mill), every scene so vividly painted. The subject matter's a bit grim—the whole thing revolves around the murder of a woman and two of her children in January of 1985*—and the descriptions of some of that are pretty vivid too, so if that sort of thing bothers you, you might want to avoid it. But damn it's a good tale, and I'm still thinking about it almost a day after finishing. Looking forward to reading Sharp Objects, though I'll be sad to finish that one because that'll be the end of her books until she writes another.
(* This isn't really a spoiler, as this is revealed in the first page of the book.)
March (3)
The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion: Think "Sheldon Cooper decides to find a wife" with a bit of Adrian Mole chucked in for good measure. I found it a little difficult to read at first, but once I got into the main character's cadence, once I got to understand him, that all melted away. It was a funny, refreshing read with an original plot and I enjoyed it very much.
Ripper by Isabel Allende: A fairly good, intriguing read about the search for a serial killer in San Francisco… only with a cast of characters to seemingly rival JK Rowling's infamously sprawling Casual Vacancy cast, except this one is perhaps slightly more difficult to keep track of. The author has a strange habit of parsing out huge chunks of backstory seemingly as it comes to her, which can be confusing as it is not always clear what's flashback and what's not. It's something you begin to get used to. However, there's an aspect about the ending that irritates me to the point of almost ruining the whole book for me. I don't require a 100% happy ending, but when it isn't happy for the stupidest, out-of-character reason… bah.
It's Raining Men by Milly Johnson: Much better than I expected, but then again, I expected a brainless chick-lit story. This is about three women who book a trip to a spa in the English countryside; they are unsatisfied with their lives in London and each suffer heartache (fuckwit boyfriends) just before the holiday. When they arrive, they realize instead that they've mistakenly booked into a cabin in a xenophobic little village that doesn't appear to have many women in it. Seems the folks in little Ren Dullum have a secret…
Interesting plot (a tiny bit predictable in places, but made up for when it is the opposite of predictable). It was really a light and fluffy read, but definitely not brainless. And yes, I might have gotten a bit weepy near the end.
April (2)
Life After Life by Kate Atkinson: Gear change; something a bit weightier. Read for an online book club of sorts, this is the story of Ursula Todd, destined to live her life over and over again; sometimes dying before being born in February of 1910, sometimes living much longer. It's really an in-depth examination of how the smallest of events can send one's life careening off into a different direction. I was impressed by the level of detail of life at that time, the vivid and minute examination of (for example) life in pre-WWII Germany, or in London during the Blitz (and how gruesome it was and could be). But I enjoyed what was and could have been, even if the Indigo Girls song kept flitting through my head—how long 'til my soul gets it right?—and I kept thinking of that TNG episode with the time loop, "Cause and Effect". The end, well, the order in which the events at the end occur, I have speculation that the larger, world-shattering events were less important to Ursula than the smaller, more personal ones. It's a book that has kept me thinking for days after I've finished it.
The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton: Deliciously written in the style of the mid-1800s and set in Gold Rush New Zealand, and intriguing and tantalizing in so many ways. The first half of this book was utterly riveting as the mystery of why the 12 men have assembled in the hotel like they have. The first part of the second half occurs after the evening in the hotel, mostly in the 'present' with alternating flashbacks, which concludes the story, more or less. The latter part of the second half flashes back to before the book begins to fill in some—but not all—details, with extremely short sections and even shorter chapters. I later learned that this mirrors the cycles of the moon, keeping with the ongoing astrological theme; each part (of which there are 12, like the zodiac itself) is half as long as the last. There are still some plot points about which I am somewhat uncertain—who killed X? How much treasure was there, really? And so forth—and I'd love to sit down with a chronological untangling, if such a thing exists. This book requires patience, but it's ultimately worth it.
May (4)
Dept. of Speculation by Jenny Offill: An odd, fragile story about a woman (the wife), a man (the husband), their child, and their and their strange, strained relationship. Short paragraphs, brief snapshots comprise the story; language is spare because not a word is wasted. It's not very a long book, but it resonates.
Among the Janeites by Deborah Yaffe: Marvelously reverent documentation of what it's like to be a Jane Austen fan from someone on the inside. She moves from costuming/cosplay to literary criticism to the Austen tour in England to writing and many other things in between, tying it all together at the end of the book at the JASNA convention that year in Dallas. My only disappointment—and this is minor—is that there is no mention of one of the more famous results of (what she terms) "Austenmania's Big Bang" (i.e. the wet white shirt moment): Bridget Jones' Diary. (I don't count the passing reference at the end, when she's describing the intro to Andrew Davies' talk at the JASNA convention. I found myself very emotional during many of the passages; anyone who has ever been a part of any fandom will find that this book speaks to them: "It was like meeting people you'd known all your life for the first time."
Artists in Crime and Death in a White Tie by Ngaio Marsh (audiobooks narrated by Benedict Cumberbatch): Fairly good murder mysteries with exceptionally (and creatively) descriptive prose, and Cumberbatch's voices for the different characters are very entertaining. I'm curious to read more by her.
June (3)
The Mandala of Sherlock Holmes by Jamyang Norbu: A pastiche that aims to try to fill in Holmes' time in Tibet, with an introduction and an epilogue that sets it in the real world, as if actual documents were discovered in Dharamshala. I really enjoyed the look back at India and Tibet of the time and the ambient way it is described. But it really lost me at the (for lack of a better term) supernatural events that occur that are not subsequently explained by logic and reason. (Yes, there is a hint of philosophy and religion to Holmes, which is sourced in the book, but even I think he'd be looking for rational explanations.) And the person who turns out to be the Dark One… well, when he is revealed, I really did laugh out loud, groan a bit and think it was a bit much. Overall, though, I did enjoy it, and I love that it was written by a Tibetan.
The Murder Room by Michael Capuzzo: The true story of the founding of The Vidocq Society and its three founding fathers, Richard Walker (master psychological profiler and the closest thing to a real Sherlock Holmes as I've ever seen), Frank Bender (forensic sculptor extraordinaire, responsible for the age-progression of mass murderer Eugene List, leading to his arrest 11 days later), and William Fleisher (dedicated customs officer and the man with the contacts to make the society come together). A pretty good read, though a bit unpleasant at times (as you would expect from a book like this), and at times it seems to jump around in time without warning, which can be disorienting.
Whitechapel: The Final Stand of Sherlock Holmes by Bernard Schaffer: Holmes meets Jack the Ripper? I was intrigued at once. Unfortunately, it's a little too vividly and gratuitously gruesome, the characterization of Holmes and Watson feels off, the writing's not very good (basic grammar errors, to boot), and there's no mystery in revealing who "Jack" is in the first 20% of the book. I couldn't finish reading it.
Liars and Saints by Maile Meloy: The saga of a family which begins before World War II and ends at the turn of the twentieth century. It quietly builds like a storm, unfolding like a vine, branching out in unexpected directions, just like real life. It's not aiming for a grand denouement; for this book, it's the journey, not the destination, though as you get nearer to the end it will take you when you least expect it and squeeze on your heart just a little, if you're human. Very good.
July (4)
A Family Daughter by Maile Meloy: You might be tempted to think this is a reboot / alternate history of Liars and Saints, but that's only partly true. There are just as many twists and turns, and it's still a good read, but I'm not sure it packs as much of an emotional punch as Liars and Saints.
The Quick by Lauren Owen: Recommended by an online acquaintance, the synopsis of this book had me so intrigued (even if I did spoil myself by reading, of all things, the Library of Congress description at the beginning). It starts out strong, but sad to say, goes a bit off the rails. I don't know if the author (who is a literary academic) was intending to mimic the style of Wilkie Collins (who tells the story, sometimes in epistolary form, from multiple points of view in a serial manner), but if she was, I don't think it succeeded; it doesn't feel a cohesive whole to me in the same way The Woman in White did. Why start out with so much focus on James, then tear that focus away when things get… interesting for him? And to leave the end of the book—the very last line of the book—on such a massive cliffhanger is frustrating when so much time is (in my opinion) unnecessarily spent on Charlotte and Arthur's travels across Europe. Not a bad read, just could have used a bit of tightening up via the input of an editor.
The Scales of Justice by Ngaio Marsh (audiobook read by Benedict Cumberbatch): The lightest of the three audiobooks I have had a chance to sample, if a murder mystery can ever be deemed 'light'. The performance is, again, stellar, and Marsh's prose is exquisite (though I was surprised to hear the phrase "tricked out with diamonds," in describing a walking stick, in a book with a copyright of 1955).
The Silkworm by Robert Galbraith: The second of the Cormoran Strike books by Galbraith, aka JK Rowling, and dare I say it, it's better than the first. Reading this was one of those exquisite tortures in that I wanted to know how it happened but I didn't want it to end. There's a bit of meta going on, too; the plot takes place within the literary circles of London, focused around a book in which the characters are based on the characters that surround the mystery; one gets the feeling that each of the fictional Silkworm characters is based on a real person in the literary worlds, or at least an amalgam. (And the book within a book is called Bombyx Mori, which means… The Silkworm.) If you liked the first book, I think you'll like this one more (though be warned that the murder, when it happens (well into the book), is a bit gorier than the one in The Cuckoo's Calling).
As an aside, I really admire the work he's (er, I suppose she's?) done with the character of Cormoran Strike. His one-legged-ness often figures into the story but never to evoke pity or to connote he is anything less than a great detective, and the fact that she chose to make him this way is anything but an afterthought. Strike is flawed, so three-dimensional and so real (even if I do picture him looking a bit like Steven Moffat). Anyone who thinks Rowling is a hack is a moron.
August (1)
Lost for Words by Edward St Aubyn: I thought choosing another 'seedy underbelly of the literary world' novel was good timing; plus, I'd heard so many good things about it (particularly how funny it is), I thought it would be a win. Colour me disappointed. While there are brilliant moments of prose, overall it was a bit scattered, the plot predictable, and the resolution a bit unsatisfying. And I didn't think it was funny.
September (4)
The Improbable Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, edited by John Joseph Adams: A reprint anthology of 28 short stories in the Holmes canon that focus on his mantra of sorts: "…when you have eliminated all which is impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth." Some are excellent (Neil Gaiman's Lovecraftian mash-up "A Study in Emerald" is probably the best); some are… not (I really wanted to like the offerings by more familiar names). Overall, more hit than miss.
Encounters of Sherlock Holmes, edited by George Mann: Another Holmes pastiche anthology, this time featuring lesser-known authors. Overall not a bad collection, possibly even better than the previous collection in terms of plot and writing. One story that stood out to me with regards to a topic I've never seen covered in Holmes pastiches is "The Pennyroyal Society" by Kelly Hale (about birth control and abortifacients at the end of the 19th century). "The Loss of Chapter Twenty-One" by Mark Hodder is also a very good read. The Frankenstein one and Martian one, though, I could have done without.
How to Build a Girl by Caitlin Moran: This book surprised me. For most of it, I kept groaning at how much the story so closely seemed to mirror her own (widely known) upbringing and life. I didn't expect that anything that happened could surprise me… but it did. The writing is fantastic and very funny, and redeemed itself at the end, almost literally; chapter 24 of 25 is a punch to the gut.
The only thing that stands out as improbable is… if she was a Lady Sex Explorer, cystitis being the notable thing she dealt with seems improbable.
The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman: Another fantastical and intriguing novel, scary in parts, fascinating in others (and these two areas often overlap). Surprising in its introspection. Leaves you wondering about all of those childhood memories you can no longer seem to access.
October (4)
The House of Silk by Anthony Horowitz: A Sherlock Holmes novel set in time about a year before Reichenbach, but only put down on paper by Watson long after the fact because of what transpires in the story. Liked everything about this one: really very convincingly canon-like; the language is right and the characterization is spot on. Watson's present-day (i.e. 1918 or thereabouts) ruminations/reflections about Lestrade and Mrs Hudson are wonderful and touching. The story itself is quite intriguing and the denouement is not quite what I expected. I had a hard time putting this one down and that's saying something, given how many Holmes pastiche short stories I've read this year.
The Wrong Knickers by Bryony Gordon: Think of this as Bridget Jones 2.0, only with much more, er, extreme situations—Bridget, for example, never did coke. It's light and funny and ridiculous in the same ways as Bridget Jones' Diary is. A bit predictable, sure, but it delivered exactly what I was expecting.
Q Are Cordially Uninvited… by Rudy Josephs (a Star Trek: The Next Generation novella): At long last, the official Pocket Book rendition of the Picard/Crusher wedding. Entertaining enough, but the writing was not particularly snappy or in fact all that good, there was no sense of the love of their relationship or their attraction*, or and the ending was not as satisfying as I would have wanted.
(* I do understand that they aren't going for a romance novel, but it seemed a bit too clinical.)
The Rosie Effect by Graeme Simsion: A sequel to his first novel, The Rosie Project. This book does not disappoint. In some respects it's better and funnier than the first. My only complaint is that there's not much of Rosie herself in the book. But Don Tillman is in fine form once again.
November (4)
Dust and Shadow by Lyndsay Faye: A Sherlock Holmes pastiche that places him in the middle of the Ripper murders. I appreciated the fantastic meshing of the facts of the case into Holmes' fictional world. I thought it well-written and riveting, though there was something very familiar about the ending and I can't place why.
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon: I didn't know what this book was about; I only recognized the line from the Sherlock Holmes story, "Silver Blaze". The narrator and protagonist is an autistic boy, and it's completely spell-binding. Unexpectedly wonderful in every way. By the end I had tears in my eyes. If you ever wanted to build a greater empathy for the autistic, wanted a window into their thought processes, I can't recommend this book enough.
Mr Darcy, Vampyre by Amanda Grange: Don't laugh. DO. NOT. LAUGH. I read this book on the (surprising) recommendation of a friend of mine who happens to holds a doctorate in Victorian literature. It was a fairly well-written, authentic, and yes, gripping yarn in the Gothic style, and I'm not ashamed to admit I enjoyed it.
In the Still of the Night by Ann Rule: The real life story of the mysterious death of Ronda Reynolds. Well told. Convinced the about-to-be-ex-husband was either involved or knows who did it. I can always count on Rule for a tale told well.
December (3)
The Miniaturist by Jessie Burton: Riveting, descriptive, well-written, and such vivid, real characters—the protagonist, Nella, is the least known-to-the-reader of all of them. Totally spellbinding, making you wonder where it was all going, and I was eager to find out. However, the spell broke for me about 80% through, leaving all of the plot threads zinging off into odd directions, as if bits of an exploded rocket on unplanned trajectories. The end left me unsatisfied, wanting more.
Us by David Nicholls: Somber but yet very funny novel of later-in-life couple, Douglas and Connie, hitting a bump in the road twenty-five years after getting together and deciding to take their sullen teenaged son, Albie, on a Grand Tour-style summer holiday, anyway. It's told in part through flashbacks to different points in their life together. Just very funny and poignant, sometimes on the very same page. Not quite the ending I was expecting, but perfect in its own way. (I like this apparent trend of older protagonists. Life doesn't end at 40.)
Both Ways is the Only Way I Want It by Maile Meloy: I didn't realize this was a book of short stories at first, so I was really confused when I moved between what I thought were chapters trying to figure out what was going on. They're not related, though they all seem to have a central theme of choices to make, paths left untaken, temptation, and so on. She's a fantastic writer, but short stories generally leave me feeling unsatisfied because they often feel unfinished. Some were much better than others.
Total number: 39
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2015-01-01 04:03 am (UTC)The other book is Q are Cordially Invited and I agree. I didn't much like it. The actual wedding in the library was nice, but I found it annoying, especially bringing Vash into it. Ugh. Never liked her character at all and it drives me nuts that they called her Vash! Picard is french and vash = cow in french! Though, I guess it is a bit fitting... (Yes, I realllly don't like her - I never call anyone cow!).
I got into reading again this year - I found reading difficult when my head hurt, even just a little bit. Then I bought a Kobo Glo and I love it! (chapter's version of the Kindle). It has it's own backlight and is less weight than an average paperback. :). And books are sometimes cheaper or even free. I just started reading the Inspector Green series by Barbara Fradkin and am enjoying it quite a bit! It's set here in Ottawa and the author is a friend's mom! ;). But the writing is fluid and visual and Green is another good, flawed lead character. :) have a great New Year!!
no subject
Date: 2015-01-01 05:35 am (UTC)Yeah, that annoyed me about Vash too, WTF.
I'm still trudging along with my Kindle keyboard... :) Interesting series, will make a note!