Books

[Birdhead]

cool.
Well, I have a signed copy of Thief of Time. My best friend has Nighr Watch. I am very impressed with PTerry: He came here! And he was funny, though I think that (upon learning my name was Tui) asking "Oh, so what does that mean? Daughter of the Night, or some such?" isn't quite as funny as Lucy (best friend) thought it was. Mind you, I think it was also partly the fact that I was utterly tongue-tied. Nice guy, though.

"We are philosophical geniuses [sic] who will one day rule the world!"
--Agent M
Ahahahaha, Ahahahaha, Ahahahaha!

[Kathy Li]

Tui, my NEIGHBORS could hear me shrieking when I got to the vegemite section of the book.

BTW, I was outlet-mall shopping, and scored big at the bookdump: Fifth Elephant, Awful Truth, Night Watch, and Thief of Time all in hardcover, about $5 apiece. And three of them are firsts! (Ok, they've got remainder marks, but still...)

Have finished Hogfather. And am now in the proper holiday spirit. Need to find a copy of Jingo...

[Birdhead]

Ho. Ho. Ho.


Is This Jolly?

Oh dear. My personal favourte anecdote was the not=So=Good King Wenceslas: somehow so appropriate, and yet so deflating... (also, that carol irritates me sometimes, no idea why...

Vegemite. Hee.

"We are philosophical geniuses [sic] who will one day rule the world!"
--Agent M
Ahahahaha, Ahahahaha, Ahahahaha!
Still the Typo Queen

[Kathy Li]

Tui, you forgot the all-caps .

(sigh). Not sure what I'm going to read after I run through all the titles that are left and close the back cover on Night Watch.

Oh. Yeah. Right. Donald Westlake. If I'm not reading Pratchett, might as well read a Pratchett recommendation.

And speaking of recommendations, I noticed something else that had me giggling fit to bust a gut in my paperback of Last Continent. I was going through the blurb-quotes in the front, and ran across (I'm paraphrasing, here): "Terry Pratchett should be locked in a room and made to write a book a month." --Elizabeth Peters, and then turned the page, and saw "If I had to name my favorite twenty books, Terry Pratchett would be half of them." --Barbara Michaels.

Snicker. Chortle. Choke.

Trust MPM.

[Birdhead]

... oops, so I did. *tires to Edit* *fails* Dammit. Oh well.

Eeh. I am so with Ms Peters. Oh yes. *nods fervently*

"We are philosophical geniuses [sic] who will one day rule the world!"
--Agent M
Ahahahaha, Ahahahaha, Ahahahaha!
Still the Typo Queen

[Kathy Li]

Yup. Completely with Ms. Peters. Even when she calls herself Barbara Michaels.

[Kathy Li]

Have just finished The Fifth Elephant and (only another Elizabeth Peters fan will get this) fell over laughing when Angua mentioned "another shirt ruined."

Sounds to me like Pratchett read a Peters.

Anyways, had a good vacation wherein I read two Julia Quinns (trashy romances), one Diane Farr (not-so-trashy romance), The Scarlet Pimpernel which sadly, disappointed me as not being as fun as the 1980's tv-movie version where Ian McKellen plays baddie Chauvelin, and a run of Discworld novels (Carpe Jugulum, Jingo, The Fifth Elephant), and got a good bite-sized chunk out of Kim Stanley Robinson's The Years of Rice and Salt (an alternate history where Western civilization was wiped out by the Black Death in the 12th century, and Buddhist/Muslim cultures end up expanding everywhere).

I had a cold for most of my vacation. You get a lot of reading done when you have a cold.

Anybody else reading anything right now?

[Birdhead]

*waves hand* Yeppers. I'm reading dude, Where's My Country? by Michael Moore. It's OK. I mean, it's good, I like him, but it's not as good as Stupid White Men, And Other Sad Excuses For the State of The Nation, which I really liked and thought was hilarious. This is funny, but it's not as funny: it's a lot mroe conspiracy theorist and because of what he's trying to do (basically incriminate George Bush), it doesn't work so well.

Ah, I know why it is: it's because he's set out with one goal in mind, doing the dirty on GWB, as opposed to his previous try-to-find-stuff-out approach, which on the whole I think I prefer.

I also bought, and have not yet read, Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson. I read the first page of so, though, and it looks scintillating. Pizza delivary, yeah baby.

AND. AND AND AND, I just have to share this with you: so, there's a Borders in Sydney, and there's a massive one close to where I'm staying, in Wahroonga. AND. They actually sell copies of the books accesibly (GOOD thing) BUT. I asked if they had the Anniversary SYWTBAW. And they said "No, but we're getting it in probably this week."

So, I MAY OWN IT soon. *crosses fingers*

"We are philosophical geniuses [sic] who will one day rule the world!"
--Agent M
Ahahahaha, Ahahahaha, Ahahahaha!
Still the Typo Queen

[Kathy Li]

I've never read any of Michael Moore's books, I've just watched his movies and some of his tv shows. I loved the episode of TV Nation with the "CEO Corporate Challenge". When he gets too deadly earnest, though, some of the fun escapes. (It's like those stupid "The Truth" anti-smoking commercials).

Good luck on snagging an anniversary SYWTBAW!

[Kathy Li]

And. Bump.

I'm starting to work my way through Umberto Eco's The Name of the Rose, Ansel Adams's The Negative, and E.R. Eddison's The Worm Ouroboros. I have no idea if I'll finish any of them, as I also seem to be on a romance-novel bender composed of equal parts Nora Roberts and Julia Quinn for some reason. Sigh.

What are you reading?

[Birdhead]

I'm reading Timeline by Robert Crighton, which I borrowed off my best friend on strong reccomendations from both her and I think it was Agent M. I'm only about ten pages in, because I just started, but I'm enjoying it. The introduction is the type I usually don't really like- the jumping-into-the-story half-way through with bemused innocent people and then only finding out what's actually happening at the end of the book, or something, type- but it was written well enough that I'm getting along well with it anyway. Will probably update opinion next time I visit this topic.

I read Snow Crash, I really enjoyed it- I picked up a new baby name, too, Hiroaki. (In case you're wondering: yes, I like unusual (in terms of culture: I'm white) names. It's my upbringing: my family is comprised of Tui Rewi Hedley and Freya, Tui and Rewi both being Maori names, Hedley just being strange, and Freya being the Norweigian goddess of beauty- the only name at all linked to my family, actually, because we're Norwegian on my mother's side. My other favourite "pet" names, that I'm sure my children will never get called but oh well, are Xiao-mei and Amiria. )

So anyway, I loved Snow Crash. I really liked some of the ideas about language, and obviously there are some great parallels with YW, the idea that there is... an ultimate language, I guess. I also liked the Metaverse. Wouldn't that be cool????

I also finished Dude, Where's My COuntry? I have to say that the rest of the book was much better than the three or so chapters I'd read when I posted, because it loses focus slightly which I think really benefits the idea he's trying to convey.
You really have to take a calculated approach to Michael Moore. He's very biased, so he's going to present facts in a very biased way, as much as he possibly can. His biases align with mine, so it's hard for me to recognise that, but to read it properly I have to. But he's still really valuable, I think.

And I'm also reading, every now and then, the Screwtape Letter. I'm enjoying them, but some of the conclusions Lewis draws I do not really like- as I'm sure y'all could guess.n

"We are philosophical geniuses [sic] who will one day rule the world!"
--Agent M
Ahahahaha, Ahahahaha, Ahahahaha!
Still the Typo Queen

[Kathy Li]

And once again, bumping this, because I'm incredibly sad. I have finished my last unread Discworld book, and now I have to wait like everybody else.

Luckily, not too much longer. A Hat Full of Sky (the next Tiffany Aching YA Discworld book) is due out in JUNE!!

[meteorite]

Sorry I've been gone, all -- I went to AZ to visit my parents, and incidentally attend the Tucson Gem and Mineral Show, where I met a lot of nice people I had only previously known from my meteorite-collecting newsgroup. More on that later, if anyone is interested...

I took the Kim Stanley Robinson book with me to read on the trip, The Years of Rice and Salt. Thoroughly enjoyed it; an excellent thing to have with you on a 6+ hour plane trip, although I think I like his book of short Martian stories better.

The last series I read was one by Jacqueline Carey, Kushiel's Dart, Kushiel's Chosen, and Kushiel's Avatar. Very detailed, lovely culture descriptions, a real epic with a plot that actually you can follow and good characters. The only thing that would make me exercise caution in recommending this series is that the main character, Phedre, is a courtesan who specializes in pain, i.e., she is a masochist, and caters to people who like to inflict it in the course of relations (trying to give an explanation without setting off censors.) This does appear repeatedly as a theme in the books, which would make me hesitate about handing them to anyone younger than, say, 14 or 15, and I'd have to consider the reader carefully. Just like some of Anne Rice's books are not suitable for younger teens. That being said, if you can get around the masochism angle, the books are good, well written, with intricate political plotting and an enjoyably nasty, cunning villain.

"Thus is Balance maintained." A Wizard of Earthsea
"Condensing fact from the vapor of nuance." Neal Stephenson, Snow Crash

[Kathy Li]

Oo, yeah. Started Years of Rice and Salt and really enjoyed as far as I got, before I got derailed by Eco's Name of the Rose. Unfortunately, my brain power's been decreasing over the last few weeks, so currently, I'm working my way through Sabatini's Scaramouche the King-Maker.

Had heard oddles of good things over the Carey books as well (with the same s&m proviso), but haven't had time to search them out.

[Gryphon]

I love Terry Pratchett!!! Lesse... I haven't read one of his books for a couple of mounths. Ugg. But I really liked Mort and Reaper Man. It's weird how in the Discworld books with Rincewind, Death is an entirely different character. He's much more sinister...

I'm deep into Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn, an awesome series by Tad Williams. Those books are HUGE, but very very good. I love them! The first one is called The Dragonbone Chair. It's 750 pages, the second 500, and the third is well over 1,000. It's a fantasy book. Not at all boring.

Has anyone read Crusader? That's a good book. Normally I stick to fantasy books... and I thought this book was a fantasy because of the title and the book cover, but it isn't. It's by Edward Bloor.

-MaThFrEaK
"Hehehe. You smell funny."
"I love fish and chicken and turkey and ham and squirrels and pork and..."
"Izza mousey!"
~Gryphon~