book list, January 2006

I made three resolutions this year. First, get a job. (Done, sort of.) Second, exercise more regularly and lose weight. (In process.) Third, keep a list of my reading material.

So. These are the books I read in January, 2006:

New: 14
---Eats, Shoots & Leaves, Lynne Truss (nonfiction: a humorously opinionated guide to punctuation)
---Warchild, Karin Lowachee (science fiction: a gritty treatment of war, piracy, and child abuse in an interstellar society)
---Burndive, Karin Lowachee (science fiction: companion to Warchild, following the son of Joss's commander. Burndive suffers from a very inaccurate back cover summary that left me anticipating a different story trajectory until at least two-thirds of my way through the book; I would have enjoyed it much more if I hadn't kept expecting it to go off on a different thematic track from the one it really does follow)
---Cagebird, Karin Lowachee (science fiction: companion to Warchild, dealing with one of the space pirates from the first two books; bleak and bitter; refugee stations and sexual abuse; somehow kindling a spark of hope from utter despair. Possibly the best of the three books)
---The Summer Tree, Guy Gavriel Kay (fantasy: book one of the Fionavar Tapestry trilogy)
---The Wandering Fire, Guy Gavriel Kay (fantasy: book two of the Fionavar Tapestry trilogy)
---The Darkest Road, Guy Gavriel Kay (book three of the Fionavar Tapestry trilogy. It's obvious that this trilogy is Kay's first published fiction -- there are some plot holes you could drive a truck through, and one can often hear the creaking of the plot as it forces characters through their motions -- but I like the story anyway.)
---Trigun, volumes 1 and 2, Yasuhiro Nightow (manga: cracked-out sci-fi on a desert planet, with gunfights)
---Trigun Maximum, volumes 1-5, Yasuhiro Nightow (manga: ditto above; it's a continuation)


Old: 9
---Helm, Steven Gould (science fiction: war and politics on an isolated colony world after the destruction of Earth; also, aikido; irritates me on some level I can't quite articulate)
---Paladin of Souls, Lois McMaster Bujold (fantasy: sequel to The Curse of Chalion, in which we learn what happens to Dowager Royina Ista after her daughter breaks the curse on their family and country; one of the more interesting magical systems I've encountered recently; also a very imaginative use of zombies)
---The Vor Game, Lois McMaster Bujold (science fiction: in which Miles Vorkosigan has fun with military hijinks)
---Memory, Lois McMaster Bujold (science fiction: in which Miles Vorkosigan, after screwing up his life and career, has to unravel a nasty internal Barrayaran conspiracy)
---A Civil Campaign, Lois McMaster Bujold (science fiction: in which Miles Vorkosigan goes courting, and so does everyone else; regency romance in space!)
---Diplomatic Immunity, Lois McMaster Bujold (science fiction: in which Miles Vorkosigan handles delicate galactic diplomatic incidents and an interesting murder mystery)
---Phoenix, Steven Brust (fantasy: a Vlad Taltos novel, in which Vlad is hired by a goddess to assassinate a king, and Bad Things predictably ensue)
---Tehanu, Ursula LeGuin (fantasy: the fourth Earthsea novel, which insists that heroic figures can have ordinary lives, so there)
---The Other Wind, Ursula K. LeGuin (fantasy: the fifth Earthsea novel, which picks up threads laid down decades before and makes them seem like the logical, inevitable trajectory of that world's development and internal mythos)


January Total = 23 books (plus a whole lot of fanfiction, a number of newspapers, and a few magazines)

book list, January 2006

I made three resolutions this year. First, get a job. (Done, sort of.) Second, exercise more regularly and lose weight. (In process.) Third, keep a list of my reading material.

So. These are the books I read in January, 2006:

New: 14
---Eats, Shoots & Leaves, Lynne Truss (nonfiction: a humorously opinionated guide to punctuation)
---Warchild, Karin Lowachee (science fiction: a gritty treatment of war, piracy, and child abuse in an interstellar society)
---Burndive, Karin Lowachee (science fiction: companion to Warchild, following the son of Joss's commander. Burndive suffers from a very inaccurate back cover summary that left me anticipating a different story trajectory until at least two-thirds of my way through the book; I would have enjoyed it much more if I hadn't kept expecting it to go off on a different thematic track from the one it really does follow)
---Cagebird, Karin Lowachee (science fiction: companion to Warchild, dealing with one of the space pirates from the first two books; bleak and bitter; refugee stations and sexual abuse; somehow kindling a spark of hope from utter despair. Possibly the best of the three books)
---The Summer Tree, Guy Gavriel Kay (fantasy: book one of the Fionavar Tapestry trilogy)
---The Wandering Fire, Guy Gavriel Kay (fantasy: book two of the Fionavar Tapestry trilogy)
---The Darkest Road, Guy Gavriel Kay (book three of the Fionavar Tapestry trilogy. It's obvious that this trilogy is Kay's first published fiction -- there are some plot holes you could drive a truck through, and one can often hear the creaking of the plot as it forces characters through their motions -- but I like the story anyway.)
---Trigun, volumes 1 and 2, Yasuhiro Nightow (manga: cracked-out sci-fi on a desert planet, with gunfights)
---Trigun Maximum, volumes 1-5, Yasuhiro Nightow (manga: ditto above; it's a continuation)


Old: 9
---Helm, Steven Gould (science fiction: war and politics on an isolated colony world after the destruction of Earth; also, aikido; irritates me on some level I can't quite articulate)
---Paladin of Souls, Lois McMaster Bujold (fantasy: sequel to The Curse of Chalion, in which we learn what happens to Dowager Royina Ista after her daughter breaks the curse on their family and country; one of the more interesting magical systems I've encountered recently; also a very imaginative use of zombies)
---The Vor Game, Lois McMaster Bujold (science fiction: in which Miles Vorkosigan has fun with military hijinks)
---Memory, Lois McMaster Bujold (science fiction: in which Miles Vorkosigan, after screwing up his life and career, has to unravel a nasty internal Barrayaran conspiracy)
---A Civil Campaign, Lois McMaster Bujold (science fiction: in which Miles Vorkosigan goes courting, and so does everyone else; regency romance in space!)
---Diplomatic Immunity, Lois McMaster Bujold (science fiction: in which Miles Vorkosigan handles delicate galactic diplomatic incidents and an interesting murder mystery)
---Phoenix, Steven Brust (fantasy: a Vlad Taltos novel, in which Vlad is hired by a goddess to assassinate a king, and Bad Things predictably ensue)
---Tehanu, Ursula LeGuin (fantasy: the fourth Earthsea novel, which insists that heroic figures can have ordinary lives, so there)
---The Other Wind, Ursula K. LeGuin (fantasy: the fifth Earthsea novel, which picks up threads laid down decades before and makes them seem like the logical, inevitable trajectory of that world's development and internal mythos)


January Total = 23 books (plus a whole lot of fanfiction, a number of newspapers, and a few magazines)