Not so yay: Yahoo!Mail has stopped working for me. Completely. It went down this weekend and is still not operational. Is anyone else having this problem? I'm going to see if I can get my barely-used gmail account working again, but until then I'm not getting comment notifications or anything. And my apologies to everyone I owe notes to! (Siria, Eliza, Cat, Wychwood, Ami...) I'll get back to you as soon as I can.
And even though I had a lame week of late work nights and lying around watching The Dead Zone a lot, here's this week's fairly pathetic booklog:
Week 8: 19-25 February 2007
44. 84, Charing Cross Road, Helene Hanff — My first reread of the year; I got nostalgic for this collection of letters between a New York writer and a London bookseller when Siria wrote to me from Charing Cross. It was even better than I remembered—hilarious and sweet. And tragic: Helene keeps wanting to go visit her English friends, and she's never able to. And do you know why? Dental work! OH MY GOD, YOU GUYS! *clings to
...And yeah, then I started crying at work, which is what I get for reading while waiting for the proofs to come back around. But, uh...assuming you're not an emotional wreck like I am (and even if you are) I highly recommend this book. It is the very definition of delight.
45. Smoke and Ashes, Tanya Huff — The third in Huff's Smoke series, which is in turn a spin-off of her Blood series. You don't really need to have read that, though; I've only read the first of the Blood books, and I'm following these just fine. More than fine—I adore these books. The first (Smoke and Shadows) was a little slow getting going, but they just keep getting better. And if you like humorous, meta, slashy sci-fi/fantasy adventures, then these books are tailor-made for you, man. The main character, Tony, is a PA on a Vancouver-produced vampire detective TV show, but what he knows and the rest of the people in the production don't is that all that supernatural stuff is real, and he has the somewhat awkward relationship with his vamp ex-lover to prove it. What I'm really loving about this series is that as supernatural things keep happening to Tony, his friends and co-workers don't stay oblivious, but become more and more involved; there's a great sense of community and family with this wacky little production company, and it's just terrific. Plus, the characters are hilarious, there's tons of meta-humor, and the slow build in the relationship between Tony and Lee, one of the stars of the show, is fantastic. Okay, and if that doesn't sell you: this third volume includes a threesome in the solution to save the world. World-saving threesomes: how can you not be all over that? *g*
46. Girlfriend in a Coma, Douglas Coupland — From what I've read, this seems to be the least popular of Coupland's novels. (Although Coupland fans are weird: among his devotees, there's the least amount of agreement about what constitutes a good Coupland book that I've ever seen.) I can definitely see why, although there were things I enjoyed about it. The problem, I think, is that it feels like several books mushed together: there's the Jared-the-ghost plot (similar but less effective than dead!Cheryl's narration in Hey Nostradamus!), the late '70s vs. '90s plot, the actual girlfriend-in-a-coma plot...and just when you're adjusting to all of that, there's the post-apocalyptic plot. It's too much, and it really fails to come together, not just logically (not something I'm looking for in a Coupland novel) but emotionally—and that is something at which he normally excels. So, yeah: it's a mess. Not a "I regret reading this" mess, but as all of the really good bits are pretty much replicated in his other works, it does feel kind of extraneous. I mean, Coupland's written something like ten novels and a bunch of non-fiction, so unless you're a completist (which I am) there's really no reason to read this particular book.
47. Hard Core Logo, Michael Turner — I still haven't seen the movie that was based on this, but I've absorbed rather a lot through fannish osmosis. I was surprised at how different the book was on some major points, but rather than go too deeply into that and risk spoiling people on either, I'll just say: this is an interesting, but slight, looked at a bunch of fucked up, dried up, punk rockers. It's written in verse and in other scraps—journal entries, interview bits, photographs—which is cool because it's different, but it does prevent Turner from being able to delve too deeply into any of the characters, their motivations, or even specifically what's happening. By which I don't mean it's confusing—not at all—it's just shallow, a passing glimpse. I think the film must go deeper, and I'm really itching to see it now. Plus, Callum. *eg*
Total Books: 47
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Date: 2007-02-26 09:25 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2007-02-26 09:45 pm (UTC)Speaking of tea, guess what's another thing that causes tooth decay? Yup. Tea reduces the pH level of your mouth and promotes plaque build up. So basically, I'm not supposed to eat ANYTHING I like. No oranges. No Altoids. No tea.
I give up.
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Date: 2007-02-26 09:52 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2007-02-27 12:30 am (UTC)Don't worry, giving up tea is TOTALLY where I draw the line. *clutches her Barry's*
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Date: 2007-02-27 12:44 am (UTC)(You are all right for tea, aren't you?)
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Date: 2007-02-27 02:40 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-02-27 02:47 am (UTC)I am glad that the Barry's is still fortifying you. You know you have only to say the word, and more is yours!
Oh, and I am partway done with your banner. It is giving me a wee bit of trouble, but I'm sure I'll come up with *some* kind of idea for it :)