Elizabeth Culmer (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
edenfalling) wrote2007-07-01 03:41 pm
edenfalling) wrote2007-07-01 03:41 pm
Entry tags:
book list, June 2007
It's time for the continuing adventures of Liz and her reading list! These are the books I read in June 2007.
(You know, I have to stop reading so much manga. It can't possibly be good for me. *grin*)
New: 16
---Crashing Through: A True Story of Risk, Adventure, and the Man Who Dared to See, Robert Kurson (nonfiction: the story of Michael May, a man blind since he was 3 years old, who regained his vision through experimental surgery. Kurson shows how May's approach to life in general played into his reaction to vision, and explains technical details clearly, both when dealing with the surgery and when dealing with optical illusions and brain scans.)
---Glasshouse, Charles Stross (science-fiction: in the aftermath of a war fought mostly with information technology -- where computer virus can rewrite your brain to make you think the way their designers want you to think -- several survivors end up in an experimental recreation of the late 20th century. They think the mock-world will be a good place to lie low and recover, but their new home has sinister implications. A fascinating book.)
---Wizards, Jack Dann and Gardner Dozois, eds. (fantasy: an anthology of stories nominally about wizards. Some are amazing, some are weird, and some are, frankly, awful. Luckily, the good outweighs the bad.)
---The Long Road Home: One Step at a Time, G. B. Trudeau (comics: a Doonesbury collection, in which we follow BD from his injury in Iraq through the early stages of his recovery back in the US.)
---One Piece vols. 5-6, 8, 10-12, 14, Eiichiro Oda (manga: pirates on crack. Okay, yeah, I'm hooked. The sheer zany exuberance, and the likeability of the characters, pulls me past the places where I'd normally scream about how the worldbuilding doesn't make any sense and the plot developments come out of nowhere, and on and on... *grin* The character development is consistent, which helps cover the other flaws.)
---Godchild vol 5, Kaori Yuki (manga: a young English nobleman and his manservant in Victorian/Edwardian times, with poison, murder, and random supernatural elements. Creepy gothic weirdness, moral ambiguity, and very pretty art.)
---Samurai Deeper Kyo vol. 21, Akimine Kamijyo (manga: samurai fights with random supernatural trappings. This volume is about Shinrei and Hotaru, both backstory and a battle.)
---Hana-Kimi vol. 1, Hisaya Nakajo (manga: a girl disguises herself as a boy and enrolls in an all-boys' school in order to get close to her idol. Extremely silly, but awfully cute and good-hearted.)
---Araiso Executive Committee vol. 1, Kazuya Minekura (manga: this is on crack. It's like Minekura took her own characters from Wild Adapter and did goofy high school AU fanfiction with them... except I think this series was published first, so WTF? Fun, albeit rather over-the-top.)
---Wild Adapter vol. 3, Kazuya Minekura (manga: two young men, a strange drug case, and various underworld machinations in greater metropolitan Tokyo. Film noir, horror, and science fiction run together through a blender, with generous subtext.)
Old: 30
---Many Waters, Madeleine L'Engle (science-fiction/fantasy/young adult: companion to A Wrinkle in Time. Sandy and Dennys Murray accidentally send themselves back in time to the story of Noah and the flood. Beautiful and uplifting... and very neatly sidesteps what my fandom-corrupted mind insists is a blatant setup for a threesome. Bad Liz, no biscuit!)
---Dealing with Dragons, Patricia C. Wrede (fantasy: Book One of the Enchanted Forest Chronicles, in which Cimorene runs off to become a dragon's princess)
---Searching for Dragons, Patricia C. Wrede (fantasy: Book Two of the Enchanted Forest Chronicles, in which Mendanbar has problems with wizards and meets Cimorene; my favorite of the series)
---Calling on Dragons, Patricia C. Wrede (fantasy: Book Three of the Enchanted Forest Chronicles, in which someone steals Mendanbar's sword and a quest ensues)
---Talking to Dragons, Patricia C. Wrede (fantasy: Book Four of the Enchanted Forest Chronicles, which picks up 17 years later and resolves the semi-cliffhanger at the end of Book Three)
---The Dead Zone, Stephen King (fiction/horror: a young man wakes up from a five-year coma with the 'gift' of precognition. Then he discovers he may be the only person who can prevent a horrifically dangerous man from becoming president of the United States. I love this book, especially the bittersweet might-have-beens between Johnny and Sara.)
---On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, Stephen King (nonfiction: part autobiography, part discussion of writing. I picked this up looking for a bit where he talks about The Dead Zone and kind of got sucked in and reread the whole thing. King is compulsively readable like that.)
---The Elements of Style 3rd Edition, William Strunk Jr. and E. B. White (nonfiction: one of only three writing books I have ever found useful, rather than merely interesting. Clarity, clarity, clarity. *grin*)
---The Outlaws of Sherwood, Robin McKinley (historical/fantasy: a retelling of the Robin Hood legends. Notable for a dogged air of realism in the way a group of outlaws manage to stay hidden in a forest -- and the greater realism in the short length of their career. Also, McKinley's Robin is the worst archer in his band, which amuses me.)
---Sherwood, Parke Godwin (historical/fantasy: another Robin Hood story; this one bucks tradition and occurs during the Norman Conquest rather than the Crusades. In an interesting spin, Godwin makes the sheriff of Nottingham a sympathetic character, and substitutes war, politics, and culture clashes as a more depersonalized enemy.)
---Flash: The Return of Barry Allen, Mark Waid, Greg LaRocque, Roy Richardson, et al (comics: you know, I remember this seeming a lot better when I was a teenager...)
---Flash: Terminal Velocity, Mark Waid, et al (comics: this one, on the other hand, holds up, despite the overwriting and melodrama. I think it's because this story arc is clearly built around a love story; the superhero trappings are more downplayed.)
---Angel Sanctuary vol. 19, Kaori Yuki (manga: brilliant and utterly fucked up; Mudo Setsuna learns he's the reincarnation of a rebellious angel, and things get progressively stranger from there.)
---Wild Adapter vol. 1, Kazuya Minekura (manga: two young men, a strange drug case, and various underworld machinations in greater metropolitan Tokyo. Film noir, horror, and science fiction run together through a blender, with generous subtext. This volume is mostly introduction.)
---Saiyuki vols. 1-9, Kazuya Minekura (manga: four guys and a jeep travel west to save the world, but the journey is more important than the destination. This is brilliant and I love it.)
---Saiyuki Reload vols. 1-7, Kazuya Minekura (manga: continuation of Saiyuki)
June Total: 46 books (plus several magazines, a few newspapers, and a lot of fanfiction)
Year to Date: 222 books (117 new, 105 old)
(You know, I have to stop reading so much manga. It can't possibly be good for me. *grin*)
New: 16
---Crashing Through: A True Story of Risk, Adventure, and the Man Who Dared to See, Robert Kurson (nonfiction: the story of Michael May, a man blind since he was 3 years old, who regained his vision through experimental surgery. Kurson shows how May's approach to life in general played into his reaction to vision, and explains technical details clearly, both when dealing with the surgery and when dealing with optical illusions and brain scans.)
---Glasshouse, Charles Stross (science-fiction: in the aftermath of a war fought mostly with information technology -- where computer virus can rewrite your brain to make you think the way their designers want you to think -- several survivors end up in an experimental recreation of the late 20th century. They think the mock-world will be a good place to lie low and recover, but their new home has sinister implications. A fascinating book.)
---Wizards, Jack Dann and Gardner Dozois, eds. (fantasy: an anthology of stories nominally about wizards. Some are amazing, some are weird, and some are, frankly, awful. Luckily, the good outweighs the bad.)
---The Long Road Home: One Step at a Time, G. B. Trudeau (comics: a Doonesbury collection, in which we follow BD from his injury in Iraq through the early stages of his recovery back in the US.)
---One Piece vols. 5-6, 8, 10-12, 14, Eiichiro Oda (manga: pirates on crack. Okay, yeah, I'm hooked. The sheer zany exuberance, and the likeability of the characters, pulls me past the places where I'd normally scream about how the worldbuilding doesn't make any sense and the plot developments come out of nowhere, and on and on... *grin* The character development is consistent, which helps cover the other flaws.)
---Godchild vol 5, Kaori Yuki (manga: a young English nobleman and his manservant in Victorian/Edwardian times, with poison, murder, and random supernatural elements. Creepy gothic weirdness, moral ambiguity, and very pretty art.)
---Samurai Deeper Kyo vol. 21, Akimine Kamijyo (manga: samurai fights with random supernatural trappings. This volume is about Shinrei and Hotaru, both backstory and a battle.)
---Hana-Kimi vol. 1, Hisaya Nakajo (manga: a girl disguises herself as a boy and enrolls in an all-boys' school in order to get close to her idol. Extremely silly, but awfully cute and good-hearted.)
---Araiso Executive Committee vol. 1, Kazuya Minekura (manga: this is on crack. It's like Minekura took her own characters from Wild Adapter and did goofy high school AU fanfiction with them... except I think this series was published first, so WTF? Fun, albeit rather over-the-top.)
---Wild Adapter vol. 3, Kazuya Minekura (manga: two young men, a strange drug case, and various underworld machinations in greater metropolitan Tokyo. Film noir, horror, and science fiction run together through a blender, with generous subtext.)
Old: 30
---Many Waters, Madeleine L'Engle (science-fiction/fantasy/young adult: companion to A Wrinkle in Time. Sandy and Dennys Murray accidentally send themselves back in time to the story of Noah and the flood. Beautiful and uplifting... and very neatly sidesteps what my fandom-corrupted mind insists is a blatant setup for a threesome. Bad Liz, no biscuit!)
---Dealing with Dragons, Patricia C. Wrede (fantasy: Book One of the Enchanted Forest Chronicles, in which Cimorene runs off to become a dragon's princess)
---Searching for Dragons, Patricia C. Wrede (fantasy: Book Two of the Enchanted Forest Chronicles, in which Mendanbar has problems with wizards and meets Cimorene; my favorite of the series)
---Calling on Dragons, Patricia C. Wrede (fantasy: Book Three of the Enchanted Forest Chronicles, in which someone steals Mendanbar's sword and a quest ensues)
---Talking to Dragons, Patricia C. Wrede (fantasy: Book Four of the Enchanted Forest Chronicles, which picks up 17 years later and resolves the semi-cliffhanger at the end of Book Three)
---The Dead Zone, Stephen King (fiction/horror: a young man wakes up from a five-year coma with the 'gift' of precognition. Then he discovers he may be the only person who can prevent a horrifically dangerous man from becoming president of the United States. I love this book, especially the bittersweet might-have-beens between Johnny and Sara.)
---On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, Stephen King (nonfiction: part autobiography, part discussion of writing. I picked this up looking for a bit where he talks about The Dead Zone and kind of got sucked in and reread the whole thing. King is compulsively readable like that.)
---The Elements of Style 3rd Edition, William Strunk Jr. and E. B. White (nonfiction: one of only three writing books I have ever found useful, rather than merely interesting. Clarity, clarity, clarity. *grin*)
---The Outlaws of Sherwood, Robin McKinley (historical/fantasy: a retelling of the Robin Hood legends. Notable for a dogged air of realism in the way a group of outlaws manage to stay hidden in a forest -- and the greater realism in the short length of their career. Also, McKinley's Robin is the worst archer in his band, which amuses me.)
---Sherwood, Parke Godwin (historical/fantasy: another Robin Hood story; this one bucks tradition and occurs during the Norman Conquest rather than the Crusades. In an interesting spin, Godwin makes the sheriff of Nottingham a sympathetic character, and substitutes war, politics, and culture clashes as a more depersonalized enemy.)
---Flash: The Return of Barry Allen, Mark Waid, Greg LaRocque, Roy Richardson, et al (comics: you know, I remember this seeming a lot better when I was a teenager...)
---Flash: Terminal Velocity, Mark Waid, et al (comics: this one, on the other hand, holds up, despite the overwriting and melodrama. I think it's because this story arc is clearly built around a love story; the superhero trappings are more downplayed.)
---Angel Sanctuary vol. 19, Kaori Yuki (manga: brilliant and utterly fucked up; Mudo Setsuna learns he's the reincarnation of a rebellious angel, and things get progressively stranger from there.)
---Wild Adapter vol. 1, Kazuya Minekura (manga: two young men, a strange drug case, and various underworld machinations in greater metropolitan Tokyo. Film noir, horror, and science fiction run together through a blender, with generous subtext. This volume is mostly introduction.)
---Saiyuki vols. 1-9, Kazuya Minekura (manga: four guys and a jeep travel west to save the world, but the journey is more important than the destination. This is brilliant and I love it.)
---Saiyuki Reload vols. 1-7, Kazuya Minekura (manga: continuation of Saiyuki)
June Total: 46 books (plus several magazines, a few newspapers, and a lot of fanfiction)
Year to Date: 222 books (117 new, 105 old)
no subject
(Anonymous) 2007-07-02 02:29 am (UTC)(link)Also, if you liked the Dealing with Dragons series, you might want to read Sorcery and Cecelia by Patricia C. Wrede (again) and Caroline Stevermer. Two girl cousins in a sort of AU Victorian England with magicians and things, communicating by letter. Though I don't like the sequel as much, I think this first book is good fun.
Finally (more randomly), if you like complex plot, try the Crown of Stars series by Kate Elliot. Sometimes, it can almost seem overwhelming, but the plot is so interesting...just when you think you know everything, there's another twist out of nowhere! Plus the series is finished (seven books) so you don't have to worry about how far the plot is extending itself *cough* Robert Jordan *cough*.
Anyway, just some suggestions from a fan since you don't have enough to do already, lol. Ttyl, looking forward to any and all of your future postings!
no subject
You're the third person who's recommended Kate Elliot to me. I think I shall have to look into this series...