Let It Booklog
Apr. 4th, 2009 04:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
trinityofoneMy personal life is utterly insane right now, so I am going to do my favorite thing and completely ignore it. Woo-hoo!
31. Cell, Stephen King — In which King Technophobe turns everyone with cell phones into zombies—or rather, into the Borg. I was more into this in the early chapters when it was survivors vs. zombies; the Borgian bits bored me a little. I was also a little skeeved that King chose to make a black man in a Harvard sweatshirt the leader of the Borg army—there’s so much nasty stuff one could read into an educated black dude being used as the representative of the mind-enslaving Big Bad. But I am afraid to touch Stephen “magical Negro” King’s racial issues with a ten-foot pole, so I’m just gonna leave it at that.
I’m focusing on the negative rather early here, aren’t I? That’s actually not all that fair—there was in fact a lot about this novel that I enjoyed. King is great at envisioning post-apocalyptic landscapes; what you’ve got here in Cell is basically a more succinct version of the good parts of The Stand. So while it never achieves the heights of the best parts of The Stand, it never hits that book’s low points, either. Also, remarkably for King, one of the main characters is a gay man—a gay man who’s awesome! And who actually survives! The friendship between this fellow, Tom, and Clay, our everyman hero, is by far the best part of this novel. It’s also slashy as hell. At one point, oh-so-hetero Clay actually thinks about how much he is going to miss Tom’s smile. Hee! How has the internet seemingly failed to produce fic for this? I want to read all about Clay and Tom’s wacky post-apocalyptic adventures! Because if surviving the end of the world isn’t the perfect excuse to experiment with your sexuality, I don’t know what is.
32. Serenity: Better Days, Brett Matthews — I liked this a lot more than Those Left Behind, although the art is still randomly screwy (dude. Jayne is not a blond. Jayne should NEVER be a blond) and I did not get the ending—both in terms of what the hell actually happened in the climactic battle (bad art! Bad!) and in terms of the believability of Mal’s big decision. But everyone’s “I’m rich!” fantasies were fun, and, well. I miss my show. I’ll keep taking what I can get.
33. Feet of Clay, Terry Pratchett — There’s nothing new that I can say about how awesome and funny Terry Pratchett is. Read him.
34. Blonde Roots, Bernardine Evaristo — What if Africans had been the ones to enslave Europeans instead of the other way around? That’s the premise Evaristo uses to launch this harrowing alternate history, which in general does a fantastic job shedding fresh light not just on the horrors of slavery—which, even if we are all generally aware of them, it can never hurt to be reminded in stark, brutal, specific detail: people did these things to other people—but also on slavery’s ongoing ripples and aftereffects, exposing the very white, Eurocentric way we may still consider the natural way to view the world.
When Evaristo sticks to these aspects of her story, I think it works amazingly well; however, she makes some odd auxiliary choices. There’s a map at the beginning of the book that physically alters the way Earth’s continents are rearranged, putting Europe where Africa is, and part of Africa where Europe is, but leaving the British Isles alone, so Londinium is one of the great seats of power of the African Empire, but it still has its Roman name—why? Europe is described as cold and grey, and Africa balmy, as if they were still located in their usual hemispheres—huh? And to confuse things further, at times Evaristo seems to be setting her story in the 18th or 19th centuries, when comparable events took place in our history, but there exist aspects of technology that are utterly modern—her protagonist escapes at one point on an Underground Railroad that is literally the London Underground. I found all of this incredibly confusing and needlessly distracting. Why complicate things so? To me it seems completely unnecessary—just off-putting.
Anyway, if you can manage to handwave Evaristo’s seemingly bizarre world-building decisions—as I was eventually able to do—this is well-worth reading. And if you can explain to me the purpose behind said decisions, I would love to hear your theories!
35. Tall Tales and Wedding Veils, Jane Graves — Better than average chicklit/romance thing. It doesn’t hurt that this features some of my very favorite Awesomely Stupid Plot Devices: Whoops! Did We Just Get Married? and For Various Awkward Reasons, Let’s Pretend We’re Really In A Really Real Relationship. Oh sweet cliché! You are better than the brownies I just baked, and they are, if I may say, some damn fine brownies.
Anyway, the other thing that distinguished this book from the herd was its heroine, who’s the opposite of flighty: a serious, no-nonsense CPA whose best quality is her cool, steady competence—and it’s this very quality that first makes the flaky manslut hero fall in love with her. Yes! First, how great is it to see a romantic heroine appreciated for her smarts—take that, Mr. “Kiss Away Her Competence” from First Date! Second, it’s nice having competence recognized as an attractive quality, period. Being really really good at something = super sexy. I’m always surprised this doesn’t come up more.
Graves’ hero is more standard-issue: he’s supposed to be Mr. Sexy Sex Man, but his bag of tricks seems to mostly include things like fur-lined handcuffs and whipped cream, which, a) only really vanilla people think are kinky, and b) seriously, whipped cream? Chocolate syrup? I HAVE NEVER GOTTEN THAT. Someone please explain. Personally, I don’t want my dessert foods to taste like sex, and I don’t want my sex to taste like dessert foods, either. You’re diminishing both pleasures by combining them!
Okay, that’s a big enough overshare. What I’m trying to say is that despite some flaws, this annoyed me way less than most books of its type, which from me can probably be considered a ringing endorsement. I mean…it made my bus ride pretty entertaining. Sometimes, that’s everything.
36. Let It Snow, John Green, et. al. — I’d heard the same thing from several people: that the first two novellas in this collection are really fun, and that the third one is super annoying. I love John Green (author of the second story) so I really wanted to give this a shot—other people’s opinions be damned, I told myself! Well, now that I’ve read it, I can add my thoughts to the list you too may choose to ignore: The first two novellas are really fun. The third is super annoying.
The first of these loosely-connected tales is by Maureen Johnson, whom I had never read before. Her story makes me want to remedy that: it was cute without being saccharine, and well-written, despite ending a bit abruptly. John Green’s contribution was not his finest work, but it was fun and I liked his main couple, especially tough-gal The Duke. But Lauren Myracle’s story…oy. Her main character was incredibly shallow and self-centered, and with the addition of touches like an old lady who claims to be Whiny Girl’s guardian angel, abandons the realism of the previous two tales. In fact, by having the final story, the one that also serves to wrap up the other two, Myracle gets the opportunity to write Johnson and Green’s characters. This is…not a good thing. Their dialogue loses its wit and charm in her hands, and she makes The Duke giggle. May I just say that I have a growing hatred for the word “giggle”? Most people, when they laugh, do not giggle—despite what a lot of bad fanfic and apparently Lauren Myracle seem to think. Here’s the official list of people I think you can attribute giggles to:
1. Preteen girls
2. Certain anime characters
3. Jon Stewart
I welcome further suggestions. But note that The Duke is not on there. Nor should she be. I wish this book could have consisted purely of Johnson and Green’s contributions and Myracle could have left The Duke and everyone else alone.
37. Sharp Teeth, Toby Barlow — Epic werewolf poetry. Allow me to repeat that: Epic. Werewolf. Poetry. Yup, this is a novel in verse—a novel in verse about gangs of werewolves roaming L.A.’s back alleys and docks and twisting hillside paths. How cool is that?
Barlow makes it pretty darn cool. His language has a lovely rhythm to it—it really does work as poetry. And his story and characters are fascinating, weaving together to form a wonderful tale about community. (With the occasional violent werewolf attack.) Not everything hangs together perfectly in the end, but this book has improved for me with time—my memories of certain images and emotions conveyed are strong and still evocative, and I look forward to reading this again at some point in the future.
Okay, one more time: Epic werewolf poetry. Awesome.
38. Godmother, Carolyn Turgeon — What This Book Is Being Marketed As: Fluffy retelling of the Cinderella story from the godmother’s point of view! She was kicked out of fairyland for falling in love with Cinderella’s prince; now, as an elderly bookstore clerk in present day New York, she has the chance to redeem herself by doing some matchmaking for a free-spirited hair stylist and her wealthy, recently-divorced bookstore owning boss! There’s a wealthy bookstore owner in this book, so you know it’ll be an optimistic fairytale!
What This Book Actually Is, Based On One Interpretation of Its Ambiguous Ending: Cinderella’s godmother grew up in a fairyland that seems as realistic and well-realized as one of those mid-’90s plastic fairy kingdom toys that unfolded from a Pepto-Bismol-pink clamshell case that looked like it maybe in a previous life held somebody’s diaphragm. She fell in love with Cinderella’s prince after seeing him one time, which makes her kind of want to off Miss Cinders rather than get her and Charming together. Luckily, Cinderella is suicidally depressed and tells the godmother to just go to the ball in her place. Godmother does, comes back to find Cinderella has slashed her wrists with her broken glass slipper. But if the godmother can manage that hair stylist/wealthy bookstore owner hookup, then everything’s still cool!
What This Book Actually Is, Based On the Other Interpretation of Its Ambiguous Ending: The “godmother” is actually a crazy old lady who’s escaped into a fantasy world after her younger sister’s rape and suicide (?) when they were girls. At the end, she thinks she’s getting to return to fairyland, but actually, she just kills herself.
In Conclusion: It’s so nice to know that whichever way you slice it, someone’s veins are getting sliced too! Also good to know: if this author offers you a nice, refreshing glass of Kool-Aid, it’s probably best to pass.
39. Strangers, Taichi Yamada — A spooky and affecting Japanese ghost story that unfortunately tumbles a bit too far into horror movie cliché at the end. Still, it’s a quick read, and for the most part I found it atmospheric and enjoyable.
40. The Arrival, Shaun Tan — Beautifully illustrated and conceived wordless graphic novel that puts a fantastic spin on the immigrant experience. Tan makes the new world his immigrants arrive in seem wonderfully—and suitably—alien by filling it with mysterious creatures and exotic architecture; the whole thing has a slight steampunk vibe. And his use of flashbacks is stunning. Tan’s pictures really are worth a thousand words and more.
Total Reviews: 40/76
31. Cell, Stephen King — In which King Technophobe turns everyone with cell phones into zombies—or rather, into the Borg. I was more into this in the early chapters when it was survivors vs. zombies; the Borgian bits bored me a little. I was also a little skeeved that King chose to make a black man in a Harvard sweatshirt the leader of the Borg army—there’s so much nasty stuff one could read into an educated black dude being used as the representative of the mind-enslaving Big Bad. But I am afraid to touch Stephen “magical Negro” King’s racial issues with a ten-foot pole, so I’m just gonna leave it at that.
I’m focusing on the negative rather early here, aren’t I? That’s actually not all that fair—there was in fact a lot about this novel that I enjoyed. King is great at envisioning post-apocalyptic landscapes; what you’ve got here in Cell is basically a more succinct version of the good parts of The Stand. So while it never achieves the heights of the best parts of The Stand, it never hits that book’s low points, either. Also, remarkably for King, one of the main characters is a gay man—a gay man who’s awesome! And who actually survives! The friendship between this fellow, Tom, and Clay, our everyman hero, is by far the best part of this novel. It’s also slashy as hell. At one point, oh-so-hetero Clay actually thinks about how much he is going to miss Tom’s smile. Hee! How has the internet seemingly failed to produce fic for this? I want to read all about Clay and Tom’s wacky post-apocalyptic adventures! Because if surviving the end of the world isn’t the perfect excuse to experiment with your sexuality, I don’t know what is.
32. Serenity: Better Days, Brett Matthews — I liked this a lot more than Those Left Behind, although the art is still randomly screwy (dude. Jayne is not a blond. Jayne should NEVER be a blond) and I did not get the ending—both in terms of what the hell actually happened in the climactic battle (bad art! Bad!) and in terms of the believability of Mal’s big decision. But everyone’s “I’m rich!” fantasies were fun, and, well. I miss my show. I’ll keep taking what I can get.
33. Feet of Clay, Terry Pratchett — There’s nothing new that I can say about how awesome and funny Terry Pratchett is. Read him.
34. Blonde Roots, Bernardine Evaristo — What if Africans had been the ones to enslave Europeans instead of the other way around? That’s the premise Evaristo uses to launch this harrowing alternate history, which in general does a fantastic job shedding fresh light not just on the horrors of slavery—which, even if we are all generally aware of them, it can never hurt to be reminded in stark, brutal, specific detail: people did these things to other people—but also on slavery’s ongoing ripples and aftereffects, exposing the very white, Eurocentric way we may still consider the natural way to view the world.
When Evaristo sticks to these aspects of her story, I think it works amazingly well; however, she makes some odd auxiliary choices. There’s a map at the beginning of the book that physically alters the way Earth’s continents are rearranged, putting Europe where Africa is, and part of Africa where Europe is, but leaving the British Isles alone, so Londinium is one of the great seats of power of the African Empire, but it still has its Roman name—why? Europe is described as cold and grey, and Africa balmy, as if they were still located in their usual hemispheres—huh? And to confuse things further, at times Evaristo seems to be setting her story in the 18th or 19th centuries, when comparable events took place in our history, but there exist aspects of technology that are utterly modern—her protagonist escapes at one point on an Underground Railroad that is literally the London Underground. I found all of this incredibly confusing and needlessly distracting. Why complicate things so? To me it seems completely unnecessary—just off-putting.
Anyway, if you can manage to handwave Evaristo’s seemingly bizarre world-building decisions—as I was eventually able to do—this is well-worth reading. And if you can explain to me the purpose behind said decisions, I would love to hear your theories!
35. Tall Tales and Wedding Veils, Jane Graves — Better than average chicklit/romance thing. It doesn’t hurt that this features some of my very favorite Awesomely Stupid Plot Devices: Whoops! Did We Just Get Married? and For Various Awkward Reasons, Let’s Pretend We’re Really In A Really Real Relationship. Oh sweet cliché! You are better than the brownies I just baked, and they are, if I may say, some damn fine brownies.
Anyway, the other thing that distinguished this book from the herd was its heroine, who’s the opposite of flighty: a serious, no-nonsense CPA whose best quality is her cool, steady competence—and it’s this very quality that first makes the flaky manslut hero fall in love with her. Yes! First, how great is it to see a romantic heroine appreciated for her smarts—take that, Mr. “Kiss Away Her Competence” from First Date! Second, it’s nice having competence recognized as an attractive quality, period. Being really really good at something = super sexy. I’m always surprised this doesn’t come up more.
Graves’ hero is more standard-issue: he’s supposed to be Mr. Sexy Sex Man, but his bag of tricks seems to mostly include things like fur-lined handcuffs and whipped cream, which, a) only really vanilla people think are kinky, and b) seriously, whipped cream? Chocolate syrup? I HAVE NEVER GOTTEN THAT. Someone please explain. Personally, I don’t want my dessert foods to taste like sex, and I don’t want my sex to taste like dessert foods, either. You’re diminishing both pleasures by combining them!
Okay, that’s a big enough overshare. What I’m trying to say is that despite some flaws, this annoyed me way less than most books of its type, which from me can probably be considered a ringing endorsement. I mean…it made my bus ride pretty entertaining. Sometimes, that’s everything.
36. Let It Snow, John Green, et. al. — I’d heard the same thing from several people: that the first two novellas in this collection are really fun, and that the third one is super annoying. I love John Green (author of the second story) so I really wanted to give this a shot—other people’s opinions be damned, I told myself! Well, now that I’ve read it, I can add my thoughts to the list you too may choose to ignore: The first two novellas are really fun. The third is super annoying.
The first of these loosely-connected tales is by Maureen Johnson, whom I had never read before. Her story makes me want to remedy that: it was cute without being saccharine, and well-written, despite ending a bit abruptly. John Green’s contribution was not his finest work, but it was fun and I liked his main couple, especially tough-gal The Duke. But Lauren Myracle’s story…oy. Her main character was incredibly shallow and self-centered, and with the addition of touches like an old lady who claims to be Whiny Girl’s guardian angel, abandons the realism of the previous two tales. In fact, by having the final story, the one that also serves to wrap up the other two, Myracle gets the opportunity to write Johnson and Green’s characters. This is…not a good thing. Their dialogue loses its wit and charm in her hands, and she makes The Duke giggle. May I just say that I have a growing hatred for the word “giggle”? Most people, when they laugh, do not giggle—despite what a lot of bad fanfic and apparently Lauren Myracle seem to think. Here’s the official list of people I think you can attribute giggles to:
1. Preteen girls
2. Certain anime characters
3. Jon Stewart
I welcome further suggestions. But note that The Duke is not on there. Nor should she be. I wish this book could have consisted purely of Johnson and Green’s contributions and Myracle could have left The Duke and everyone else alone.
37. Sharp Teeth, Toby Barlow — Epic werewolf poetry. Allow me to repeat that: Epic. Werewolf. Poetry. Yup, this is a novel in verse—a novel in verse about gangs of werewolves roaming L.A.’s back alleys and docks and twisting hillside paths. How cool is that?
Barlow makes it pretty darn cool. His language has a lovely rhythm to it—it really does work as poetry. And his story and characters are fascinating, weaving together to form a wonderful tale about community. (With the occasional violent werewolf attack.) Not everything hangs together perfectly in the end, but this book has improved for me with time—my memories of certain images and emotions conveyed are strong and still evocative, and I look forward to reading this again at some point in the future.
Okay, one more time: Epic werewolf poetry. Awesome.
38. Godmother, Carolyn Turgeon — What This Book Is Being Marketed As: Fluffy retelling of the Cinderella story from the godmother’s point of view! She was kicked out of fairyland for falling in love with Cinderella’s prince; now, as an elderly bookstore clerk in present day New York, she has the chance to redeem herself by doing some matchmaking for a free-spirited hair stylist and her wealthy, recently-divorced bookstore owning boss! There’s a wealthy bookstore owner in this book, so you know it’ll be an optimistic fairytale!
What This Book Actually Is, Based On One Interpretation of Its Ambiguous Ending: Cinderella’s godmother grew up in a fairyland that seems as realistic and well-realized as one of those mid-’90s plastic fairy kingdom toys that unfolded from a Pepto-Bismol-pink clamshell case that looked like it maybe in a previous life held somebody’s diaphragm. She fell in love with Cinderella’s prince after seeing him one time, which makes her kind of want to off Miss Cinders rather than get her and Charming together. Luckily, Cinderella is suicidally depressed and tells the godmother to just go to the ball in her place. Godmother does, comes back to find Cinderella has slashed her wrists with her broken glass slipper. But if the godmother can manage that hair stylist/wealthy bookstore owner hookup, then everything’s still cool!
What This Book Actually Is, Based On the Other Interpretation of Its Ambiguous Ending: The “godmother” is actually a crazy old lady who’s escaped into a fantasy world after her younger sister’s rape and suicide (?) when they were girls. At the end, she thinks she’s getting to return to fairyland, but actually, she just kills herself.
In Conclusion: It’s so nice to know that whichever way you slice it, someone’s veins are getting sliced too! Also good to know: if this author offers you a nice, refreshing glass of Kool-Aid, it’s probably best to pass.
39. Strangers, Taichi Yamada — A spooky and affecting Japanese ghost story that unfortunately tumbles a bit too far into horror movie cliché at the end. Still, it’s a quick read, and for the most part I found it atmospheric and enjoyable.
40. The Arrival, Shaun Tan — Beautifully illustrated and conceived wordless graphic novel that puts a fantastic spin on the immigrant experience. Tan makes the new world his immigrants arrive in seem wonderfully—and suitably—alien by filling it with mysterious creatures and exotic architecture; the whole thing has a slight steampunk vibe. And his use of flashbacks is stunning. Tan’s pictures really are worth a thousand words and more.
Total Reviews: 40/76
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-04 11:11 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-04 11:21 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-04 11:23 pm (UTC)Besides (as you pointed out), he did the story better with 'The Stand'. From what I read, this was a different version, but crappier.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-04 11:38 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-05 12:54 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-05 01:53 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-05 01:16 am (UTC)(What is it with the compulsion to replace the letter "i" with "y," anyway?)
(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-05 01:56 am (UTC)(And I have no idea. People need to stop.)
(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-05 02:01 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-05 02:09 am (UTC)"Hi, I'm Susan Godsgyft. Nice to meetcha."
(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-05 02:14 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-05 02:32 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-05 02:33 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-05 08:49 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-05 01:54 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-05 02:00 am (UTC)I mean, ahem. Duly noted.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-05 03:51 am (UTC)1. Preteen girls
2. Certain anime characters
3. Jon Stewart
4. Anderson Cooper
(And checking your comments, I can see
I am really tempted to check out Godmother now. Sharp Teeth is definitely going on my to read list.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-06 01:08 am (UTC)What? NOES. Did I not make it clear that I thought it was awful?
Sharp Teeth, OTOH, rocks pretty darn hard. ;-)
(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-05 04:54 am (UTC)Fluffy retelling of the Cinderella story from the godmother’s point of view! She was kicked out of fairyland for falling in love with Cinderella’s prince; now, as an elderly bookstore clerk in present day New York, she has the chance to redeem herself by doing some matchmaking for a free-spirited hair stylist and her wealthy, recently-divorced bookstore owning boss!
That sounds like a book I would love to read! The other two versions, probably not so much.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-06 01:10 am (UTC)I did want to read that first, fluffy version! That's probably why my reaction was so very much "WTF?"--because I thought I was going to be encountering one thing, and instead I encountered something else—and a not a very good something else.
Oh well, at least it was a book I got for free. *eg*
(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-05 09:03 pm (UTC)her protagonist escapes at one point on an Underground Railroad that is literally the London Underground.
I don't know how it fits with the story, exactly, but the London Underground is a good deal older than people tend to assume - parts of it date back to the 1850s. So it might not necessarily be an anachronism?
Let It Snow, John Green, et. al.
I've actually read books by both Johnson *and* Myracle! I didn't hate Myracle, though. I should look out for this book, y/y?
(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-06 01:06 am (UTC)I'd recommend reading anything else John Green's written over Let It Snow (especially An Abundance of Katherines (http://trinityofone.livejournal.com/127399.html#cutid3) or Paper Towns (http://trinityofone.livejournal.com/171668.html#cutid8)). At its best, Let It Snow is cute; those other books are good. But I will be looking out for more Maureen Johnson—even though (spoiler alert!) the first full-length book of hers I read, Devilish, did not impress me all that much.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-04-06 11:22 am (UTC)Oh, hey, I already had An Abundance of Katherines on my list, I just didn't realise that was *him*! :)
Try The Bermudez Triangle and see what you think of that?