tumbly. by dotsara!

Progress: 22 down, 18 to go (list)

21. A History of the World in 6 Glasses, Tom Standage
Another survey class-like book. Lots of good and interesting stories, but after Salt (Kurlansky), I expected similar enthusiasm and never really found it. Still: it’s a fast read and I may be the last one on the planet, but now I know cola (kola) was/is an actual ingredient!

22. Lost in a Good Book, Jasper Fforde
Oh, Thursday: you will get into trouble, won’t you. I think what I like about Fforde so far is that he doesn’t provide (or indeed ever promise) tidy endings. That bothered me a tiny bit with Lost in a Good Book at first, but after a few days of thinking about it, it makes total sense—not least because now I’m on the hook to read the rest of the Thursday series. (:

Progress: 20 down, 20 to go (list)

I’ve kept up reading at a fairly brisk pace, but forgetting to note them or get pictures before lending the books out. Oops!

And Then There Were None, Agatha Christie
As the first Christie book I’ve read, it’s a pretty good one. The reveal took me completely by surprise and stretched believability… a little bit. Lesson learned? If in receipt of a note inviting me to some dodgy island for a week… don’t go.

Salt A World History, Mark Kurlansky
Kurlansky’s storytelling and enthusiasm make Salt a fun read, one well-peppered with “how about that!” moments. I really enjoy these survey-class-like books when they’re done so well; I’ll be adding the rest of Kurlansky’s catalog to my list, now…

The Night Circus, Erin Morgenstern
Less than 30 pages into the sample, I was hooked enough I bought the hardcover (I know). I really, really like Morgenstern’s style: The Night Circus isn’t strictly linear, but it’s never confusing and the timelines join up nicely.

The Mother Tongue, English and How It Got That Way, Bill Bryson
Another survey class that had me cracking up on the bus daily. This is definitely a book that will stand up to being re-read (and not just for the chapter on swearing).

Five Skies, Ron Carlson
I didn’t expect to like Five Skies as much as I do. I didn’t settle in until a quarter of the way through, but then I was all in. Carlson has a steady, purposeful pace for Darwin, Arthur, and Ronnie that works beautifully. I’d wish for the book to be longer, but it can’t be, y’know? This is definitely a favorite for the year.

The Heroes of Olympus, Book Two: The Son of Neptune, Rick Riordan
Percy! What keeps me coming back to Riordan’s books is how fun they are. Are they perfect? No. But what they might lack in literary polish, they more than make up for with consistently-written (and growing) characters and stories. Not to mention, here in Neptune, a foul-mouthed horse who doesn’t appreciate being underestimated.

The Scorpio Races, Maggie Stiefvater
I knew that I would like The Scorpio Races—I like Stiefvater’s style. What I didn’t know was that I’d like it enough to read it twice. In three weeks. I know! It’s graphic—water horses given to maiming riders—but she’s so good at developing distinct characters and letting the reader find the humor and making her stories earn everything they get. (It’s been optioned for a film, I think it would be ace in the style of “The Secret of Kells”.)

Progress: 13 down, 27 to go (list)

Which: Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, John Le Carré

Another choice made when I was taken in by the trailer (previously: Wettest County) and officially the most challenging book of the year.

Challenging because Smiley’s headspace is dense. For most of the book, I felt I had no grasp of actual plot (Tiff warned me about this). I liked Peter’s sections better just for the comprehension! Oy.

And then? The last 60 pages move Tony Scott-fast and it turns out Le Carré did his job really well because everything is falling into place and I’m totally keeping up. (:

Progress: 12 down, 28 to go¹ (list)

Which: Jane Slayre, Charlotte Brontë and Sherri Browning Erwin

These mash-ups have to walk a fine line, I think. On the one hand: there’s the risk of boring the reader with too little monster oomph (I’m looking at you Pride and Prejudice and Zombies); on the other, there’s the risk of nauseating the reader with too much monstery squishiness (I’m glaring at you Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters [grr]).

Luckily for you (and me!) Browning Erwin does a nice job of not forgetting who Jane, Rochester, and St. John are when she folds in the vampires, zombies, and werewolves. The monster language is distracting a handful of times, but the rest of the time it was cracking me up. I mean, of course Mrs Reed was a vampire. (:

¹ Book 11 was The Girl in the Blue Beret by Bobbie Ann Mason. It’s all right, but I find I’m eh enough about it that it doesn’t warrant its own post. So there.

Progress: 10 down, 30 to go (list)

Which: Persuasion, Jane Austen

The shortest read time (2 days) and the first saw-the-movie-first of 2011. I’ve seen parts of the Shouty Rochester¹ version, but it’s the 2007 BBC version (see also…) which is fixed in my brain. And I’ve seen it enough that reading the book turned into a series of, “oh, I see what they did there with that bit” and “hey! I thought Benwick said that!”

Parts of Persuasion which are great:

• character histories bubbling up via conversation and not info dumps
• Anne Elliot
• second chances that are a teensy bit contrived, yet fully earned
• the book-long reminder to be aware of whose advice you take and why
• Wentworth’s letter (are you kidding me? eek!)

Parts of Persuasion which could do with a punch to the throat:

• Sir Walter Elliot. DISLIKE

So, y’know: will read again. (:

¹ Shouty Rochester = Ciarán Hinds as Rochester in the. most. wretched. Jane Eyre adaptation I’ve seen. There is no humor in his Rochester, not to mention Samantha Morton’s smug (?!) Jane (with too little spine), and so their relationship comes over as mostly abusive and gross.

Progress: 9 down, 31 to go (list)

Which: The Wettest County in the World, Matt Bondurant

It took me a while to warm up to this book. The 3 brothers I was interested in from the off, but the way Bondurant executes his time shifts kept me off balance until more than halfway through the book.

Also? Sherwood Anderson is the most annoying character (based on the author) I’ve read in a very long time. Honestly, with the whinging over Hemingway and Faulkner and the letters to his wife. I rolled my eyes nearly every time one of his chapters got started.

I’m still a little knee-jerk about Bondurant’s unquoted dialogue. It might be unfair, but that’s a Cormac McCarthy thing for me, so it felt like an affectation here. But! I like the book a lot (really!). Great story, believable characters, and little flashes of Southern Gothic? I’m there.

In progress.

The Wettest County in the World is… odd. Something about it makes me squinty, despite my interest in the Bondurants. Maybe it’s the unquoted, mid-paragraph dialogue. That’s McCarthy territory, sir (and thus far, you are no McCarthy).

Progress: 8 down, 32 to go (list)

Which: Kingdom Come, Mark Waid & Alex Ross
(recommended by Jeff)

My superhero knowledge is pretty thin: movies & tv shows? Yes. Actual issues of the source material? Not so much. And this is the second graphic novel I’ve read (the first: Watchmen) where that doesn’t seem to matter. Oh, I’m sure there are references lost on me, but for the most part: all the context I need is right there.

What impresses me most about the story is the allegory that’s inescapable, but not hamfisted. The way McCay and Spectre glide between settings (Superman and Wonder Woman here, Batman and Lex there, undisciplined “metahumans” […I know] everywhere) keeps everything rolling without confusion.

And the art! It’s so beautiful. The light and the angles and the expressions… and the way Spectre and McCay show up on very nearly every page… so good.