It's March -- what are you reading?

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Hmmm... let's see:
  • Drowning Pool by Syd Moore - atmospheric ghost/haunting story.
  • The Cross by Scott G. Mariani - a Vampire Federation novel.
Probably going to add a bunch more later this week. Maybe A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness...

As for the kiddos I tutor, we're currently reading Department 19 by Will Hill. They are quite taken by the amount of, er, gory scenes involving Dracula, Frankenstein and co...
 
Hex said:
Just wept my way through the closing chapters of Clockwork Princess. Brings me back to what I said about heightened emotion. It was too much. Think I might have a bit of a break from Cassandra Clare.
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The ending was quite perfect, I thought. It's certainly a very unique way of resolving a love triangle. :)

Jem Carstairs is totally my "book boyfriend" :)
 
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I found it much too intense and as I was reading it, was aware that I wouldn't have chosen to read it if I'd known what it was about.

I quite liked the resolution of the love triangle, though I never really felt that Tessa loved Jem like she loved Will, no matter how often I was told she did (I loved him, but that's different!). But to have young love finally consummated and then the next chapter, pretty much, being the death of the young lover fifty years (or whatever) later, was really difficult -- and she milked it for all it was worth. I found it uncomfortably painful. And if I want discomfort and pain, I can read lit-fic, not YA fantasy.

One of the nice things about young love consummated endings is that you have the impression they're going to be happy together and get on with life, but in this, it was all skipped to get to the deathbed scene so that the love triangle could be resolved.
 
Hex said:
I found it much too intense and as I was reading it, was aware that I wouldn't have chosen to read it if I'd known what it was about.

I quite liked the resolution of the love triangle, though I never really felt that Tessa loved Jem like she loved Will, no matter how often I was told she did (I loved him, but that's different!). But to have young love finally consummated and then the next chapter, pretty much, being the death of the young lover fifty years (or whatever) later, was really difficult -- and she milked it for all it was worth. I found it uncomfortably painful. And if I want discomfort and pain, I can read lit-fic, not YA fantasy.

One of the nice things about young love consummated endings is that you have the impression they're going to be happy together and get on with life, but in this, it was all skipped to get to the deathbed scene so that the love triangle could be resolved.
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Ah! I see your point. The first time I read it, I did get a bit weepy in the final chapter. I had to stop a couple of times to let out a breath or two out before diving in again.

I do think she does love Jem as much as Will. However, I only came to this conclusion after I read the final book in The Mortal Instruments series that actually showed it. There are a number of questions left unanswered in The Clockwork Princess that are answered in the final Mortal Instruments book... which is also very much the feels at the end but in a very good way. I promise.

Fangirl moment: If it were me, I'd have chosen Jem over Will any day. In real life, someone like Will would be far too annoying and drama-y for me.

Mind you - getting us all weepy does show that Cassandra Clare is a pretty good writer.
 
I think I need a bit of time to recover! It's not difficult to make me cry at the end of stories, and I did think it was too much, and too ladled on, for my taste. But I think she's a much better writer in this trilogy than she was in the first Mortal Instruments trilogy, even if I sometimes got a bit twitchy at the I've-researched-Victorian-London-let-me-show-you bits (the bits that weren't accurate didn't bother me at all!)

I'll be interested to see what you think of Discovery of Witches!
 
Hex said:
I think I need a bit of time to recover! It's not difficult to make me cry at the end of stories, and I did think it was too much, and too ladled on, for my taste. But I think she's a much better writer in this trilogy than she was in the first Mortal Instruments trilogy, even if I sometimes got a bit twitchy at the I've-researched-Victorian-London-let-me-show-you bits (the bits that weren't accurate didn't bother me at all!)

I'll be interested to see what you think of Discovery of Witches!
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Oh Lord, yes - take a break. I read both the Clockwork trilogy and the final book in the Mortal Instruments series (Book 6) in a row and after that I was floating around in a haze for a bit. Needed to sort out the feels, as it were.

I shall let you know what I think of A Discovery of Witches. Hopefully I will get to it this month given that my charity is running a series of Google Hangouts with authors for International Women's Day and my time is swallowed up by that.
 
Kill Shot, by Elmore Leonard. After fighting my way through another round with GRRM and Game of Thrones, I needed something light and less grim, like a psychopathic contract killer trying to snuff a couple that witnessed more than they should.
 
crooksy73 said:
I'm part way through Guy Gavriel Kay's 3rd part of the Fionavar Tapestry: The Darkest Road

Finding it similar in style/substance to Tolkien
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Hmm..a blast from the past. I read that 30 years ago..must be getting old...:) I liked the Fionavar Tapestry. Guy is a fine writer. I also recommend A Sing for Arborne, Tigana and Sarantine Mosaic.

It's probably not that much of a surprise he would have a connection with Tolkien as he spent time with Christopher Tolkien and had a significant hand (as I recall) in helping Christopher to compile the Silmarillion , which I also recommend to anyone who is a fan of LOTR and The Hobbit. Your comment in one way is ironic but also a truism as Kay was trying to show with Finoavar how to rework the mythology Tolkien drew from in a different and at the time what felt to me a slightly more contemporary, certainly 'fresh' manner. I recall reading several Tolkien clones at that time in the '80s
 
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I'm definitely enjoying it. I think it would have been interesting had the characters spent a little more time in this world and been able to see how their behaviour here was affected by them knowing about Fionavar.

Thanks for the recommends Gollum I'll check them out
 
Only read Tigana, but I did enjoy it a lot.
 
Well, I'm on a good pace this year so far. 2 months gone and I'm on my 7th book of the year. It's a good pace for me anyways.

I'm over a 1/3 of the way through Scalzi's The Last Colony and as per usual, I'm really enjoying it
 
Darkchrome said:
D'oh, I 've just been looking back thru the Feb reading thread and realise that @hitmouse replied to my post on To Say Nothing Of The Dog -which I totally missed the alert for, for some reason, and therefore quite rudely ignored - and now the thread's closed :oops:

So - I haven't finished yet (time...lack of) but it is a lovely story. Not a word I generally use but it's gentle, clever, humorous - and it has dogs! As you said, very Wodehouse in places. I don't remember the tone of Doomsday Book, much too long ago, but I do like this - and it's a complete change of pace from what I usually read.

Hopefully I will get to the end of the book before the end of the month!
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Excellent book! I've read that one a few times. For something completely different and also Connie Willis, have you read Bellwether? It's one of my favorites that I loan to everyone who wanders by. :D Which is probably why I can't seem to find mine lately....
 
Still plodding through To Ride Hells Chasm by Janny Wurts, not because of the book but I havent really been focusing on reading as much due to busy work annoyances.
 
@Hex and @The Bluestocking, I've read all three of Deborah Harkness' books. I really enjoyed the first, though it gets a little slow at times. The second is by far the best of the trilogy and the third was okay, but the second is so much fun that it kind of outshone the third. :)

I'm at present reading Charles Stross' second Laundry Files book, The Jennifer Morgue (read the first at the end of Feb.). I really like his writing style, but find I need to take breaks as it all gets a little breathless somehow.
 
Finished The Mirror Empire by Kameron Hurley. I can understand both the praise and the criticisms. It's certainly an ambitious book. Hurley gives us an epic fantasy world we've never seen before, complete with multiple universes, sentient plant-life, interesting magic dictated by the positions of the heavens, and a deep look at gender roles, including a woman-dominated society and more than two genders.

However, I think Hurley got too caught up in all this cool stuff that she lost track of the story and the characters. It's great to do something new. It's great to make us think about things like gender. But I also want engaging characters and a plot I can follow.

Only in the second half of the book did I finally get these. For the first half, I was very confused and almost gave up on it. I'm glad I stuck with it, though, and I plan on reading the next in the series when it comes out.

In summary: fascinating but deeply flawed.
 
I've started reading The Black Spider. This novella was written by the Swiss author Jeremias Gotthelf (the pen name of Albert Bitzius) in 1842 who was a contemporary of Poe and admired by luminaries of the ilk of Thomas Mann and Robert Walser.

The novel is regarded as being something of a horror classic in its physiological perceptions of the 'village herd' and the latent evil of the heart and society at large perhaps anticipating (according to the blurb) the Lovecraftian vision of comic horror....The imprint is the excellent 'NYRB Classics', which has not let me down so far.
 
Finished Gridlinked by Neal Asher. This was a good, action-packed science fiction read. I wasn't blown away, but I'll probably read something more by him at some point.
 
Ryan Mueller said:
Finished Gridlinked by Neal Asher. This was a good, action-packed science fiction read. I wasn't blown away, but I'll probably read something more by him at some point.
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That was about my reaction. Of course, now I've got 11 Asher books and am looking forward to the newest one. :) Gridlinked is in no way bad but it also turned out to be only a hint of what he could do.
 
J-Sun said:
That was about my reaction. Of course, now I've got 11 Asher books and am looking forward to the newest one. :) Gridlinked is in no way bad but it also turned out to be only a hint of what he could do.
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How does it compare with Prador Moon, which is the only Asher I've read. I enjoyed it, while recognising it was popcorn.
 
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